Fwd: [S-A] Fwd: Doubts on Pig Organ Transplants Ignored

[Guest guest]

mistylyn trepke

Sun, 6 Jul 2003 18:36:09 -0700 (PDT)

[s-A] Fwd: Doubts on Pig Organ Transplants Ignored

 

Comments?

Misty L. Trepke

http://www..com

 

 

DOUBTS ON PIG ORGAN TRANSPLANTS IGNORED

 

'Buried' report says controversial technique could put NHS at risk of

legal action if potentially lethal viruses emerge. Mark Townsend

reports A damning report revealing profound misgivings over the

harvesting of animal organs for human transplants has been secretly

buried by government officials.

 

Commissioned by the Department of Health to explore the legal and

ethical implications of xenotransplantation, the document was

designed to help formulate a strategy for proceeding with the

contentious technology.

Yet the conclusions of the independent advisers from the University

of

Glasgow they selected are so damning they warn that the animal organ

technique might even have to be abandoned in favour of other

alternatives.

 

Their findings could prove a fatal blow to hopes that the technique

could create new organs for thousands of critically ill people on the

transplant waiting list.

 

The report argues that not only has the Government ignored ethical

and public concerns over the technology, its use on patients could

prove so dangerous that the Government could face a multi-million

pound compensation bill.

 

Professor Sheila McLean and Dr Laura Williamson from the University

of Glasgow spent 16 months putting together the 700-page document,

considered by many to be the most comprehensive analysis into the

legality of xenotransplantation.

 

Its conclusions, leaked to The Observer, warn that the NHS and

companies involved would be liable for a huge lawsuit if new,

potentially lethal viruses emerge from the practice of putting pig

cells and organs into the human body. And if the disease - which some

experts have warned could create a new HIV-type virus - spreads

across the world, the Government could then be sued for breaching

international law.

 

Patients would, in effect, have to choose between death and agreeing

to lifelong monitoring and consenting not to have unprotected sex and

even children, in case any disease was passed on to another

generation.

For years, the technique has been hailed as the solution to ending

the

critical shortage of donor organs which sees two-thirds of patients

on UK waiting lists die before they can have a transplant.

 

At stake for companies hoping to produce genetically altered pigs

that will not be rejected by the human immune system is a global

market worth billions of pounds.

 

To help facilitate the acceptance of xenotransplantation, the

Government two years ago commissioned three reports into technology.

Two of them - on the risk of disease transmission and the

practicalities of transplanting animal organs - have already been

published.

 

The authors of the final, most controversial document were stunned

when they got a letter from a senior government official dated 19

June - explaining it had decided not to publish their work. Instead,

it claims its findings did not meet the needs of the UK

Xenotransplantation Interim Regulatory Authority (UKXIRA), which

offers expert guidance to the Government on the issue, and 'lacked

balance in some areas'.

 

The decision to suppress the report has caused outrage among animal

welfare groups, which have expressed deep unease about the ethics of

creating 'organ farms'.

 

Dan Lyons, of Sheffield-based animal rights group Uncaged Campaigns,

said: 'It is nothing short of sinister that the Government should

suppress such an important report, written by its own expert

advisers. Its professed commitment to open, democratic debate is a

sham, plain and simple.'

 

Co-author Williamson said: 'Failure to publish this report suggests

that UKXIRA will continue to give insufficient attention to the

substantial ethical questions raised by xenotransplantation.' Yet it

is the legal implications identified by the authors arising from the

creation of new disease that appears likely to prove most damaging to

the future of xenotransplantation.

 

Many experts fear that putting pig cells and organs into the human

body could create new viruses. The pig genome contains many porcine

endogenous retroviruses - chunks of viral DNA that pose no risk to

the animal, but which might act in unpredictable ways in the human

body. But research into pig-to-fidyl-human transplants is proceeding

because of the acute shortage of human organs and scientific

confidence that problems can be overcome.

 

In fact, although xenotransplantation is banned in Britain and

America, the Government's body is still accepting testing

applications from companies.

 

Hope has been bolstered by the announcement by PPL Therapeutics - the

company behind Dolly the cloned sheep - that trials of animal-to

human transplants could begin within two years. It followed the birth

of cloned piglets genetically engineered so their organs are unlikely

to be rejected by patients.

 

Yet McLean argues that problems concerning the legalities of the

technology mean that other techniques, such as the use of stem cells

to repair organs that have become diseased or damaged, should be

considered.

 

'If such therapies exist or could be developed in the relevant

timescale, it becomes much more difficult ethically to make the case

for xenotransplantation,' she concludes. Researchers have identified

the pig as the best potential candidate for an alternative organ

source because of the similarity between human and pig organs.

 

A Department of Health spokesman explained that UKXIRA was

considering whether a further review may be necessary which will also

take into account recent developments in the field.

 

'There are no plans currently to publish McLean's report as a

government document, but she is free to publish as she wishes,' he added.