# Reasons against pig organ transplants **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 18, 2000, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877 "2000-08-18T17:56:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2000, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/1 "2000-08-18T17:56:34Z")
I saw on an online poll at [http://www.excite.com](http://www.excite.com) that 15 percent of people would not want an organ from a pig even if they were deathly ill. What reasons would a person have that they would rather die than get a pig organ transplant? Possibilities: 1. Religious. Do some religions (besides the ones against all medicine) ban this type or all types of transplants?Would the Jewish kosher laws come into effect at all here? I would hope that they are limited to food intake, and transplants wouldn’t count. Perhaps a Jewish doper can enlighten me. 2. Animal rights. I can see that animal rights extremists might have this point of view, but I think even the majority of vegetarians wouldn’t die to save a pig. 3. Fear of cross-special disease. If you are going to die without the transplant, this argument should mean little. Unless, someone is afraid of releasing a new disease into the human population, and fears more will die from the disease than the one person being saved. 4. “It’s gross!” I hope here aren’t too many so squeemish that they would die rather than get a pig organ. Hell, I’d have a pig **turd** transplanted into me if it would save my life. Are there other reasons, or do you think the above account for the 15 percent? ---
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2000, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/2 "2000-08-19T00:05:11Z")
I would think fear of disease would be the biggest concern - for me anyway. There are lots of pig viruses we know nothing about. While most of them couldn’t infect a human, there are probably plenty that could, with unknown consequences. Obviously, if it comes down to “take the pig liver or die” you take the pig liver. But usually, it’s “take the pig liver or keep waiting for a human one” or “take the pig kidney or stay on dialysis.” The decision isn’t so clear, then. ---
**Author:** ![MysteryFellow63427](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e4f/32.png) [@MysteryFellow63427](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MysteryFellow63427)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2000, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/3 "2000-08-19T00:50:38Z")
I question the veracity of the poll. I bet a fair number of that ~15% would answer differently if they actually _were_ lying in the hospital, dying of liver cirrhosis. ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2000, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/4 "2000-08-19T01:28:22Z")
Yeah, that’s a pretty skewed sample group. They polled “people who have Excite, who respond to polls”, and since you’re more likely to vote AGAINST something that irritates or frightens you, they probably got a higher percentage of people saying “no” than they would have if they’d just walked around the mall, asking people “yes or no”. ---
**Author:** ![hawthorne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@hawthorne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hawthorne)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2000, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/5 "2000-08-19T05:39:25Z")
A further reason why people might _say_ they are against it: it could be seen as the thin end of the wedge. To put the fear of disease reason more forcefully, remember that there is some chance that a disease could not only jump species via a transplant, but could then become infectious. I doubt we have the information top make much of a guess at the probability of this, other than to say it is small. But faced with a _potential_ downside of “everyone dead” and a distrust of people who want us to take the risk, some people are going to be pretty conservative (until their child needs a transplant). picmr ---
**Author:** ![Triskadecamus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b19c9b/32.png) [@Triskadecamus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Triskadecamus)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2000, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/6 "2000-08-19T06:10:02Z")
**SNORT!** ---
**Author:** ![hawthorne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@hawthorne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hawthorne)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2000, 6:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/7 "2000-08-19T06:49:52Z")
snuffle ---
**Author:** ![Satan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Satan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Satan)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2000, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/8 "2000-08-19T15:23:41Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Revtim \* > > \*\*1) Religious. Do some religions (besides the ones against all medicine) ban this type or all types of transplants?Would the Jewish kosher laws come into effect at all here? I would hope that they are limited to food intake, and transplants wouldn’t count. Perhaps a Jewish doper can enlighten me. \*\* As far as I know, the Jewish laws are as such where G-d understands you breaking a rule if it means survivl of yourself or another person. So the choice of starvation or a BLT means you’re makin’ bacon. The choice between staying in after dark and helping someone get out of their house that’s on fire means you get your coat on. As such, I presume that if your life cannot be saved in any other way than by having a porcine pancreas replace yours, G-d understands. > [@](#): > > \*\*3) Fear of cross-special disease. \*\* Exactly what would be the chances of something like this happening? Are there records of this happening in the past? I mean aside from the “AIDS came because some Africans fucked a monkey” BS? ---
**Author:** ![hawthorne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@hawthorne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hawthorne)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2000, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/9 "2000-08-19T15:45:47Z")
> [@](#): > > _(Satan)_ > Exactly what would be the chances of something like this happening? Are there records of this happening in the past? Well, there is new-variant CJD. This is a prion disease (known as mad cow disease or BSE) which appears to have crossed from sheep to cows to humans though eating of infected tissue. It is thought but not yet known that it is transmissible through blood products. It is invariably fatal and has very long incubation times. At present its incidence is growing geometrically in the UK. Then there is influenza. Remember the Hong Kong bird-flu panic of a couple of years ago? It looks like mutations in the 'flu can cause it to jump species. And remember the 'flu has a history of killing millions when a nasty variant emerges. Lyssovirus jumped from flying foxes to horses to humans here in Australia a couple of years ago, but was rapidly contained. etc. What are the risks of this occurring during xenotransplant? As I said above, very small but positive. The pigs would be vary carefully bred and isolated. But the consequences in a worst case could be really nasty. I’m at home now, but I can post some citations from work if someone else doesn’t beat me to it. picmr ---
**Author:** ![Triskadecamus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b19c9b/32.png) [@Triskadecamus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Triskadecamus)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2000, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/10 "2000-08-19T15:59:25Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Satan \* > \*\* Exactly what would be the chances of something like this happening? Are there records of this happening in the past? I mean aside from the “AIDS came because some Africans fucked a monkey” BS? \*\* It is a field under study, and there is some information that shows it to be a growing threat. Here is a quote from a review of a study done in Britain > [@](#): > > …there are currently 1709 known pathogens–from viruses and bacteria to fungi, protozoa, and worms–plaguing humanity. 832 of those, or 49%, are zoonotic, the team concluded; but among the 156 diseases that are considered emerging, there were 114 zoonoses–that’s 73%. To put it another way, says [Mark Woolhouse of the University of Edinburgh > ], zoonoses are three times more likely to be emerging than nonzoonotic diseases, and vigilant epidemiologists should keep an especially wary eye on animal pathogens. > –MARTIN ENSERINK at Science Now ---
**Author:** ![douglips](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@douglips](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/douglips)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2000, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/11 "2000-08-19T16:31:25Z")
Just in case anyone else didn’t know what that meant (from [http://www.m-w.com](http://www.m-w.com)): Main Entry: zoo·no·sis … Inflected Form(s): plural zoo·no·ses Etymology: New Latin, from zo- + Greek nosos disease Date: 1876 : a disease communicable from animals to humans under natural conditions - zoo·not·ic … adjective ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2000, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/12 "2000-08-19T18:05:43Z")
I thought it was a somewhat accepted theory that it was possible that AIDS came from some kind of African monkey. I doubt if the theory mentions how it jumped from the monkey to humans, but I would guess that it was from butchering and/or eating the monkey, not boinking it. Here’s one article on it: [http://www.medscape.com/medscape/HIV/TreatmentUpdate/1999/tu12/tu12-03.html](http://www.medscape.com/medscape/HIV/TreatmentUpdate/1999/tu12/tu12-03.html) ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2000, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/13 "2000-08-20T14:43:26Z")
Hey, if I could get a working pig pancreas, I’d be all over it. ---
**Author:** ![edwino](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/35a633/32.png) [@edwino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/edwino)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2000, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/14 "2000-08-21T02:01:04Z")
> [@](#): > > 1. Religious. Do some religions (besides the ones against all medicine) ban this type or all types of transplants?Would the Jewish kosher laws come into effect at all here? I would hope that they are limited to food intake, and transplants wouldn’t count. Perhaps a Jewish doper can enlighten me. > \*\* It is perfectly acceptable, as far as I’m aware. The Dark Lord is correct at stating that most laws are tossed in order to save a life. My uncle had a porcine (pig) aortic valve xenograft, which lasted him quite nicely. His rabbi fully approved. Nowadays, the St. Jude valve is used most often but I believe porcine valves are still used on occasion. About zoonoses : There is always a chance, and there are several diseases you can get from eating undercooked pork. A lot of these are parasitic worm diseases, but you can’t rule out a prion disease, I suppose. But, 1. You have to consider that these animals will be raised in strict quarantine to prevent that, and that they will be thoroughly screened for any type of disease. I’d say slim-to-none chance for any bacterial or worm disease. 2. Prion disease has only been postulated to happen scrapie sheep -\> BSE cow -\> CJD human. There has been no direct scientific observation yet, and no types of prion-type problems that I am aware of from pig xenografts. I’d think you would also have to worry more about corneal/dural/nerve tissue transplants, as this is a more direct source (and prion transmission has been reported in human cadaveric transplants from cornea and dura). Also, on the AIDS link - you don’t need to get funky with the monkey. You can eat raw/undercooked monkey meat, you can come into contact with its blood or other fluids (blood into open wound/eye/mouth sore, etc). Also, there is some thought that it possibly came through polio vaccine made from a monkey cell line. I’ll dig up a few links if you are interested. ---
**Author:** ![Triskadecamus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b19c9b/32.png) [@Triskadecamus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Triskadecamus)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2000, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/15 "2000-08-21T02:56:17Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by edwino \* > \*\* > Also, there is some thought that it possibly came through polio vaccine made from a monkey cell line. I’ll dig up a few links if you are interested. > \*\* Please dig up the links debunking the accusation, as well, if you do. The current dating for the distribution of the three most prevalent strains of HIV show that the pathogen entered the human species far earlier than the Polio trials in Africa in the 1950’s. This has become a real hydra of an urban legend. The producers of the polio vaccines used have now provided their samples to independent laboratories to be analyzed twice. In both cases tests performed indicate that no Chimpanzee DNA, and no HIV DNA could be detected in the samples. In the thread about the subject I provided quotes, and links which can still be found by searching the archives. Tris ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2000, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/16 "2000-08-21T16:23:33Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Revtim \* > **1) Religious. Do some religions (besides the ones against all medicine) ban this type or all types of transplants?Would the Jewish kosher laws come into effect at all here? I would hope that they are limited to food intake, and transplants wouldn’t count. Perhaps a Jewish doper can enlighten me.** Beyond the “save a life” issue that has been brought up by previous posters, the prohibition against eating pigs applies to eating them alone, and not to other uses of them. It is possible that a Jewish person would be more likely to feel squeemish about a pig transplant than another would. But squeemishness tends to evaporate pretty quickly in a life threatening situation (see **neuroman** ’s post above). In any event, it is not a religious issue. ---
**Author:** ![Robokev](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Robokev](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robokev)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2000, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/17 "2000-08-22T18:37:56Z")
I read a poll a few years ago that asked about using human organs cloned within the body of pigs or sheep. There was a significant number (can’t remember the actual count, but it was a double digit percentage of respondents) who said it was morally wrong because it was playing god and another, smaller group who said they didn’t want to start behaving or looking like pigs because of the organ. Never underestimate the average person’s ability to be stupider than you can inticipate. ---
**Author:** ![Green\_Bean](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/green_bean/32/1760_2.png) [@Green\_Bean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Green_Bean)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2000, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/18 "2000-08-22T21:04:33Z")
I saw a 60 Minutes (or one of those other shows that are just like 60 Minutes) show a couple of years back. It dealt with this very question. They were trying to make it seem that there was a big controversy or ethical dilemma when it came to people’s decisions on whether to accept a pig transplant. The reporter asked a bunch of very ill people who were waiting for transplants whether they would accept a pig organ if it were available. The reporter kept phrasing the question in the negative, saying “you wouldn’t accept a pig heart, would you?” Basically, he was trying to get people to say that they wouldn’t take the pig organ. And all of the people said, “Hell yes! I’d take the pig organ in a second!” So, they undermined the basis of the show. The evidence presented suggested that there was no controversy–at least in terms of that particular aspect of the question. Yeah, I think that in a dire situation, virtually everybody would take the pig organ. I sure would. ---
**Author:** ![hawthorne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@hawthorne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hawthorne)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2000, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/19 "2000-08-23T13:23:32Z")
> [@](#): > > _(Green Bean)_ > Yeah, I think that in a dire situation, virtually everybody would take the pig organ. I sure would. Sure. Then again, if a member of my family were sick I’d be tempted to kill the lot of you to save them. Knowing I might do this I would agree _now_ that in such circumstances I should be stopped. picmr ---
**Author:** ![casdave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c6cbf5/32.png) [@casdave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/casdave)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2000, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877/20 "2000-08-23T14:05:26Z")
> [@](#): > > Well, there is new-variant CJD. This is a prion disease (known as mad cow disease or BSE) which appears to have crossed from sheep to cows to humans though eating of infected tissue. It is thought but not yet known that it is transmissible through blood products. It is invariably fatal and has very long incubation times. At present its incidence is growing geometrically in the UK No-one is that certain about NV-CJD rising incidence. People are recognised to have been falling victim to CJD for some time but it is now recognised that it was widely under-diagnosed. More cases are discovered because it is being looked for. The total number of deaths that have been attributed are very small indeed even when compared with leukeamia which claims more lives. At the moment we are looking at a total rate in the teens per year but the predicted ‘epidemic’ has not yet materialised and the infective material has been around long enough (something like 15years) to cast serious doubt on the worst case scenario.There has not yet been any suggested human to human infection but I suppose there might be some means such as mother to foetus. Even HIV is not considered as serious as Hep C which is not grabbing the headlines but is starting to be placed further up the agenda. The route through to humans appears to have been from Sheep remains fed to cattle in formulated feeds and from the cattle to humans, but scrapie in sheep has been known for a very long time yet is not regarded as having infected humans directly. On a slightly related note to this topic - it is thought that many of the strains of flu virus may well come from popultaions where humans and differant animals live in extremely close conditions.One form is supposed to have passed from domestic ducks through to pigs and then on to humans. These conditions of animal husbandry exist most widely in the far East and the path of infection has been followed which seems to confirm this. I would have thought that the chances of infection from a transplant animal are likely to be extremely small as they are certainly going to be raised in special conditions, indeed infection might well be much lower as human-human tranplants, since people are never isolated in such a way. As far as agents attacking the transplanted organ, I would have thought that the human defence mechanism has already developed strategies to deal with them or we would have fallen victim to those bugs at some time anyway. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reasons-against-pig-organ-transplants/29877.md?page=2)