An Alabama woman has become the third person to receive a kidney transplant from a genetically engineered pig, her doctors announced Tuesday.
Towana Looney, 53, is off of kidney dialysis after undergoing the procedure at NYU Langone Health on November 25. She was discharged from the hospital on December 6, and her doctors say she is in good health. Her surgery is the latest in a series of similar procedures known as xenotransplantation, the practice of transplanting organs from one species to another.
More than 103,000 people in the United States are on the waiting list for a transplant, with the vast majority of those needing a kidney. With human donor organs in short supply, some researchers are exploring the use of pigs as a potential source.
“I am overjoyed,” Looney said at a press conference Tuesday morning. “I’m blessed to have received this gift, a second chance at life.”
Earlier this year, surgeons carried out pig kidney transplants in living people for the first time. In March, 62-year-old Richard Slayman made history when he received a kidney from a genetically engineered pig at Massachusetts General Hospital. He was discharged from the hospital and was initially doing well, but he died nearly two months after the transplant. In a statement released by the hospital, his medical team said there was no indication that his death was the result of his transplant. In November, Slayman’s surgeon said his death was caused by an “unexpected cardiac event,” and there was no sign that his body had rejected the organ.
In the second attempt, this April, 54-year-old Lisa Pisano received both a kidney and thymus gland from a genetically engineered pig after getting a mechanical heart pump implanted days prior. The addition of the thymus, a small organ in the upper chest that’s part of the immune system, was meant to help prevent rejection. That surgery was also performed at NYU Langone. But 47 days after the transplant, her doctors elected to remove the pig kidney following several episodes of the heart pump not being able to pass enough blood through her new kidney. The kidney needs steady blood flow so that it can produce urine and filter waste. Without it, Pisano’s kidney was failing. She died in July.
Two individuals previously received heart transplants from genetically engineered pigs, the first in January 2022 and a second in September 2023, both at the University of Maryland. Those patients died less than two months after their surgeries and were too sick to leave the hospital.