A MAN’S FAILING HEART GETS REPLACED WITH THAT OF A GENETICALLY ALTERED PIG.

A 57-year-old man with a life-threatening heart disease has received a heart from pig, a groundbreaking procedure that offers hope to hundreds of thousands of patients with failing organs.

Mr. Bennett decided to gamble on the experimental treatment because he would have died without a new heart, he had exhausted other treatments and was too sick to qualify for a human donor heart, family members and doctors said.

David Bennett had terminal heart disease, and the pig heart was “the only currently available option,” according to the release. It was either the pig’s heart or death and he chose to experiment it because he said he wanted to live. He said “ “I know it’s a shot in the dark, but it’s my last choice.”
It’s been three days and he’s currently doing well.

Mr Bennett becomes the first person in the world to receive a heart transplant from a genetically altered pig.

Surgeon Bartley P. Griffith said the surgery would bring the world “one step closer to solving the organ shortage crisis”, the University of Maryland School of Medicine said in a release. That crisis means that 17 people a day in the US die waiting for an organ transplant, with more than 100,000 on the waiting list, according to OrganDonor.gov

-BBC