Saving Lives with Xenotransplantation: How Biotechs are Solving the Transplant Shortage Crisis
Some have doubts about xenotransplantation being the best solution to solving the organ crisis.
Dorothee Caminiti, director of bioethics at Markkula Center for Applied Ethics, Santa Clara University, pointed to the risks simply being too high. “Major epidemics have been initiated through cross-species transmission of viruses from animals – wild or domestic – to humans. Yet, according to experts in the field, our understanding of this complex process is still very limited.”
“And even when those risks can be better mitigated against, what other negative and currently unknown consequences will arise from mixing species? And how can we ask patients to give their informed consent in such circumstances? Most of the time, when we’ve decided to mix species in some way, the procedure made them weaker, or even extinguished them. We certainly do not want the same to happen to us, humans.”
Dorothée Caminiti, director, bioethics, quoted by Labiotech.