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Showing posts from May, 2022

Virus found in pig heart transplanted into man

  Researchers trying to learn what killed the first person to receive a heart transplant from a pig have discovered the organ harbored an animal virus but cannot yet say if it played any role in the man's death. A Maryland man, 57-year-old David Bennett Sr., died in March, two months after the groundbreaking experimental transplant. University of Maryland doctors said Thursday they found an unwelcome surprise - viral DNA inside the pig heart. They did not find signs that this bug, called porcine cytomegalovirus, was causing an active infection. But a major worry about animal-to-human transplants is the risk that it could introduce new kinds of infections to people. Because some viruses are "latent," meaning they lurk without causing disease, "it could be a hitchhiker," Dr. Bartley Griffith, the surgeon who performed Bennett's transplant, told The Associated Press. Still, development is under way of more sophisticated tests to "make sure that we don'