An Indian Surgeon did world’s first pig heart transplant to humans in 1997

Apropos your Feature on Pig Organs Head for the Clinic (1), this is not the first pig heart transplantation in the humans in the world. In 1997 in Guwahati India a heart surgeon Dr Dhaniram Barua, FRCS transplanted a pig heart in a human patient (2,3). The patient survived for a week but passed away after that. There was a huge furore in the media and the surgeon’s office was ransacked. Due to lack of ethical clearance Dr Baruah was given a 40 days jail term as reported in Nature in January 1997 (4). However, Dr Baruah’s pig heart transplant was historically the first in the world. Mentioning David Bennett as the first recipient of pig heart is a distortion of history and it should be corrected and credit should go to the pioneer. It is understood that David Bennett’s case involves a genetically modified pig heart with a Crispr/Cas mediated gene editing which itself is a novelty; however, to be historically accurate Bennet was not the first human to have received a pig heart. 

Dr Baruah achieved this feat 25 years ago unbeknownst to the western media with a normal unmodified pig heart. In fact, when Bennet’s pig heart transplant was published in January 2022 several Indian newspapers recounted Dr Baruah’s pig heart transplantation surgery of 1997 (4). Though Dr Baruah’s surgery crossed ethical boundary it has to be appreciated as the world’s first pig heart transplant in humans. He is a maverick whose methods might have been unconventional but the fact that he performed world’s first pig-to-human heart transplant in 1997 and the patient survived for a week cannot be ignored and denied. I urge the editor to please include this fact to correct an error in history of transplant surgery. 

 References: 

1. Sara Reardon (2022) PIG ORGANS HEAD FOR THE CLINIC. Nature. Vol 611, pg 654-655 

2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhaniram_Baruah, last accessed on 26/11/2022 

3. Mudur G. Indian surgeon challenges ban on xenotransplantation. BMJ. 1999 Jan 9;318(7176):79 

4. K.S.Jayaraman. (1997) Pig heart transplant surgeon held in jail. Nature. Vol 385, pg 378 

5. https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/guwahati/transplant-jogs-dhani-ram-memories/articleshow/88843361.cms last accessed on 26/11/2022

Payment for Journal Reviewers

 Of late I have noticed a sea change in the publishing model of research articles. Most of the publishing houses and journals are adopting the pay and publish Open Access model. Earlier payment was looked down upon and it was thought if your article lacked quality, you published  by paying money. But things have changed rapidly in the past 5 years. More and more journals are becoming Open Access and payment by the authors have become a norm (1).

I have also observed the reviewers are slow to act; they send their opinions across after prodding and pleading. Every editor knows how difficult it is to make the reviewers submit their comments in time. Sometimes it takes months. Their reluctance to review for a journal is not caused by professional ineptitude but by lack of payment. If the journals are taking money for publication then the editors can pay, whatever small the amount may be, to the reviewers. Silver tonic always works in getting things done. Money can be an incentive for the reviewers and the reluctance and lethargy to review can go. This can also be a pathway to generate more income by the reviewers (2,3). The process of review actually takes a long time now and mars the spirit of the scientists who submitted their articles for review. I suggest the journal editors think of paying their reviewers for speedy publication (3). Many scientists prefer a journal for faster publication process. As you increase the speed of publication, the journal profits by attracting more authors and revenue generation in the end.

Reference

1. https://ifis.libguides.com/journal-publishing-guide/open-access-models

2. Open access pay-for-review option — ethical question. Nature 590, 36 (2021)

3.https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9893124/