Baby transplant defended

Press, 31 October 1984, Page 10

Baby transplant defended

NZPA-AP Loma Linda, California “Baby Fae,” her transplanted baboon’s heart “working well” was removed from a respirator yesterday as hospital officials were criticised in the United States and Britain for not trying to find a human donor before performing the operation. The infant was removed from the critical list and doctors prepared to feed her orally for the first time since the operation, said Anita Rockwell, a Loma Linda University Medical Centre spokeswoman. “She is now listed in serious condition, which is a step better (than critical),” said Ms Rockwell. “All her vital signs are stable. She’s off the ventilator and breathing easily. Her heart is working well.” Meanwhile, doctors said that they did not know the heart. of a human, aged 2 months, was available the

day of the operation. They said that it would have made no difference because it was too large for the ailing infant, who was 14 days old and hours from death when she received the baboon’s heart on Friday. Dr Jack Provonsha, the' director of the university’s Centre for Christian Bioethics, also said that a search for a human donor was not “a high priority consideration” for surgeons “under the stress of dealing wiith a dying infant.” The transplant team leader, Dr Leonard Bailey, said that he never tried to find a human heart for “Baby Fae” because the rarity of infant donors “makes that avenue impractical with our current abilities of organ procurement.” The infant, who was identified only as “Baby Fae,” was being treated with drugs to prevent rejection of the transplanted organ. Benjamin Fortes, aged 59,

a South African accountant who received a chimpanzee’s heart in 1977, lived 3Vz dadys after his cross-species operation. Dr Paul Terasaki, a professor of surgery of the U.C.L.A. Medical School and the director of the California Regional Organ Procurement Agency, said, “I think that they did not make any effort to get a human infant heart because they were set. on doing a baboon.”

“They were set up to do this experimental procedure no matter what,” said Ms Lucy Shelton, the co-ordina-tor for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

“I think it’s tragic ... What they’ve done here is not the best thing for the patient or the family and definitely not the best thing for the baboon.”

But Dr Robert Levine, a Yale University medical

ethics expert, defended the Californian doctors. “Most heart donors are accident victims, and most infants don’t drive cars,” said Dr Levine. “So I can understand why they didn’t go out to look for a human heart donor. They knew there was a very low likelihood of finding one.” A hospital spokesman, Mr Dick Schaeffer, acknowledged that no effort had been made to find a human heart. “The head of the surgical transplant team, Dr Leonard Bailey, has conducted research in transplants between species,” he said. “We were not looking for a human heart. That was not the issue.” In Britain, animal activists have threatened to launch guerrilla-type attacks against hospitals involved in animal to human heart transplants.