For parents, their children are everything to them.
If anything goes wrong with a child, the saddest thing is for the parents.
Especially children who are born with terminal illnesses.
Parents will do whatever it takes to keep their children alive.
Even this method will be reviled by everyone in the world.
One day in 1984, a baby girl was born in a hospital in California, USA.
Her daughter was born safely, which made her mother very happy, so she named her: Stephanie Faye Pokle.
But before the joy could spread, the doctor’s words made the parents’ hearts sink into ice.
"The child suffers from cardiac hypoplasia."
The baby girl's heart has only grown half, which is a relatively rare congenital heart malformation.
Suffering from this disease means that the child will die of acute heart failure within a short period of time.
The longest survival time is only two weeks.
All the doctors expressed regret and they were all helpless.
The huge blow crushed the mother of the child, and they begged doctors to save their daughter.
But the doctor’s words undoubtedly sentenced the newborn to death:
The child’s mother, Teresa, was devastated after hearing the news.
She was a single mother and was very happy when she learned she was pregnant.
In order to be able to give birth to a child, she suffered all the ostracism and contempt from the people around her.
It was already very difficult to conceive in ten months, but after giving birth, I heard such bad news.
One can imagine the grief in Teresa's heart.
In order to save the child, Teresa immediately went through the transfer procedures.
She wanted to use the best technology to try to repair her daughter's heart.
But at the time, this kind of repair surgery was simply impossible.
Even if the repair is successful, there are no cases of extending life for more than a month.
In fact, from a theoretical point of view.
If there is a problem with the heart, all it takes is a heart transplant.
But the situation at that time was very complicated.
First of all, the child is a newborn, and heart transplant surgery is extremely risky.
It is unclear whether she can bear it.
More importantly, there was no suitable matching heart at that time.
And according to the cases at that time, no transplant operation had ever been successful.
All of this undoubtedly declared the child's death.
After learning all this, although the mother of the child fell into extreme grief, she still had no choice but to accept the reality.
In desperation, Teresa took the child home.
I want to spend the last time with my child.
Before leaving, the doctor gave her the phone number of the coroner:
"The child can live for up to half a month.
If unfortunately, you can call Make this call and he will help you.”
After returning home, Teresa began to take care of her daughter meticulously.
She will do her best in every detail, just hoping to make her daughter happy.
For her, every day she spends with her daughter is a gift from God to her.
To be able to make memories.
Teresa recorded everything her daughter did.
Every time she watched it, she burst into tears.
Maybe even she didn’t know that things would actually turn around.
When the child was brought home by his mother Theresa, he was waiting for death.
One day Teresa’s phone rang suddenly.
The content of the phone call gave the mother hope to survive.
The call came from the assistant of a famous American doctor. The assistant could not restrain his joy on the phone:
"Madam, your child's condition has improved."
However, before Teresa could be happy, the assistant's next words once again made the mother think deeply:
"We plan to transplant the heart of the baby baboon into the child."
When Teresa heard the news, her first reaction was:
“This doctor must be crazy.”
But it’s really true. ?
This doctor’s name is Bailey, an internationally renowned medical scientist.
He has been committed to the research of heart transplantation.
Transplantation of an animal's heart into another animal has also been studied.
And it was a breakthrough success.
He once successfully transplanted the heart of a lamb into an adult goat.
And the goat survived for at least a month.
Dr. Bailey has a wish:
Transplant an animal heart into a human body.
In this way, he wants to completely solve a series of human heart diseases.
At that time Bailey heard about the child.
I thought that instead of waiting to die at home, I might as well give it a try.
Maybe the operation will be very successful and the child will become healthy again.
Originally Theresa refused such surgery.
Because she does not believe that people can survive if animal organs are transplanted into humans.
But as time goes by, the child's condition becomes worse day by day.
The mother’s heart was shaken.
Afterwards, Teresa found her family and asked them to drive her to Dr. Bailey.
Perhaps Teresa’s move was crazy and unethical.
But as a mother, she would never allow her daughter to die in front of her without doing anything.
Even if the doctor's method only has a one in 10,000 chance, she is willing to try it.
After that, Bailey solved all the problems for Teresa.
At the same time, he said that he has a successful case of cross-species heart transplantation.
I want to gain Teresa's trust through this.
Finally, he told Teresa:
"If the operation is successful, it will be a major breakthrough in the history of human medicine."
In fact, both parties are also different. Just take what you need.
Bailey needs a perfect test subject.
Teresa, on the other hand, wanted her daughter to live.
Afterwards, the medical team carefully examined the child.
At the same time, they also conducted strict screening on 6 young baboons.
Through chest X-ray, liver examination, electrocardiogram and other examinations.
A suitable baboon was finally identified and then sent to the operating room for isolation and waiting.
The poor little baboon may not know that its life or death has been decided.
Before the surgery, the team of doctors and even the specifics of the surgery.
And it also involves ethical issues, which will definitely arouse public opinion.
So in order to protect the child's privacy, they changed the child's name to "Feibao".
After everything was ready, the operation officially began.
It is not known who leaked the news about the surgery.
Before the operation even started, the news had already exploded across the United States.
Transplanting a baboon heart into a human may sound unbelievable.
Soon, with the media rushing to report, the news quickly spread to every corner of the United States.
Many local media rushed to the place where the operation was performed.
They all want to know the final results of the surgery.
But at the same time, some different voices also came out.
Most people are surprised.
They believe that once the operation is successful, it will mean that there will be effective treatments for heart diseases.
However, there are still many people who believe that this move is against humanitarianism.
They believe that all life in the world is equal, and humans should not feel superior to animal life.
Because the success rate of the operation is extremely low, it is undoubtedly very cruel to deprive the baboon of his life because of this.
So members of the local animal protection society held protest banners and surrounded the surgery site.
But none of this affected Bailey's determination, and the operation continued as usual.
He and his team were busy during the operation, carefully operating every step.
Finally, after finishing all the work, the doctor put down the scissors.
Everyone in the operating room looked nervously at the abandonment, hoping that a miracle would happen.
As the beeping sound of abandonment sounded in an orderly manner, the child's various indicators began to recover.
Until the end, the indicators returned to normal levels.
After that, the child's heart began to beat strongly, and the doctor finally let out a long breath.
Outside the operating room, Teresa was anxiously waiting for news about the operation.
After a long wait, news finally came from the operating room:
“The operation was successful. The baboon’s heart started working in the child’s body, and there was no rejection for the time being. ”
Afterwards, the team of doctors appeared at a press conference and announced the good news to the United States.
"Xiao Feibao is in good condition after surgery and needs further observation."
Soon, this news detonated the medical community.
There is no doubt that this is a major breakthrough in the medical field.
But at the same time, another question was also put on the table:
"Should such an unethical surgery be performed?"
Because The operation has been successful so far.
If the corresponding technology matures in the future, will a large number of animals be unable to escape their misfortune?
Animals are innocent, and this will be a disaster for them.
On the other hand.
If the technology matures, does it mean that organs can be transplanted at will?
If there is a problem with a human organ, can a completely healthy one be transplanted from an animal?
Let’s take a step back.
If a human has transplanted animal organs, is he still a human?
Will he inherit some of the animal's habits?
But most of the voices were insulting Teresa and the doctors.
Think they don’t know how to respect nature.
This is unethical and unethical.
But Teresa didn't care about this, she just wanted her daughter to live.
She can do anything to keep her daughter alive.
The doctor was even less affected because he had more important things to do.
That is to observe the child’s postoperative reaction.
In fact, no matter whether the public agrees or condemns this operation, they all hope that the child can survive.
Fortunately, the child did not develop infection after the operation, and all indicators were normal.
But just when everyone took a deep breath, an accident happened.
Day 11 after surgery.
The child's breathing began to become rapid, and there was an obvious loss of appetite.
On the 14th day after surgery.
The child's heart function is damaged.
Day 17 after surgery.
The child has a rejection reaction.
Day 19.
The child's heart conduction was completely blocked.
Finally, on the night of the 19th day after the operation.
The child had severe rejection.
At the same time, various organs failed to varying degrees, and serious infections occurred in the body.
Although Bailey actively rescued the child.
But in the end the child died in pain.
The next day, Dr. Bailey regretfully announced the news to the outside world.
Once again aroused fierce public opinion.
People condemned the doctors and Teresa.
They believed the child could have died peacefully.
But because of their selfishness, the child suffered great pain and even mutilated a poor animal.
But the one who felt the most pain in my heart at that time was Theresa.
If there was no hope from the beginning, maybe she wouldn't be so heartbroken.
But losing hope again made the mother very sad.
But she has no regrets. If she were given a choice again, she would do it again.
Because even if it can only be extended for one day, she still hopes that her daughter can stay in the world.
Dr. Bailey also did not explain when faced with doubts and criticism.
He knew that all excuses and apologies seemed extremely pale.
But in the end, Dr. Bailey still firmly stated to the outside world:
"Because of the courage of Teresa and Feibao, I believe that in the near future, all patients with heart disease will be Babies will avoid tragedy."
The doctor's words are not without purpose.
Although the operation ended in failure, it still left behind very precious information.
If this information can help more people in the future, it will be a meaningful operation.
In fact, after the transplant operation, doctors did not give up looking for a matching human heart.
But in the end it ended in failure.
But this operation still inspired Dr. Bailey.
The following year, he successfully completed the world's first human-to-human heart transplant.
The child eventually survived and later successfully married and had children.
As for Feibao, who had passed away at that time, Teresa buried her in a very quiet place.
All outside noises will not interfere with it. This is the last care a mother gives to her daughter.
Feibao passed away, but the experiment is still going on.
After generations of research, people have made significant achievements in the medical field.
If suitable organs can be matched, most patients will be reborn.
In 2018, a German research team published research results:
They transplanted pig hearts into baboons.
The baboon survived for 195 days after surgery.
This is a major breakthrough for xenotransplantation.
Regrettably, Dr. Bailey passed away as a doctor in May 2019 at the age of 76.
In fact, no matter what field, if you want to progress and develop, you must continue to experiment and try.
In the process, more likely to be failure and helplessness.
But no matter what, it will accumulate valuable experience for future generations.
But when it comes to xenotransplantation, the big question is not whether it will succeed.
But the question mentioned before:
"If it succeeds, will humans still be human?"
On the other hand.
If animals are hunted for xenotransplantation, will this disrupt the laws of nature?
Of course, the premise of all this is that the operation must be successful.
Human medicine still has a long way to go.
I believe that after generations of research, it will eventually bring about miracles.