US surgeons successfully transplant a genetically modified pig heart into a living human for the first time earlier this month, a landmark moment in the history of medicine.
The drug cocktail surgeons used to keep the pig heart beating during the operation was made with cocaine.
The Drug Enforcement Administration gave permission for the surgeons to use nose candy.
Everybody thinks, "Oh my God, what is cocaine doing in here?" The director of cardiac xenotransplantation at the University of Maryland Medical Center told Vice.
The drug was injected into the heart to prolong its life.
The surgeon said that they were getting failures within 48 hours when they weren't using the solution. The heart became well preserved when we infused it with this solution.
The cocktail includes a number of other ingredients.
Without drugs, the heart would likely be rejected by its recipient, so scientists don't know why cocaine is an effective way to preserve hearts.
It's like a transplant from human to human, where you still have to use drugs but you know you can control it. The organ is useless if we had not done that.
The doctor behind the first pig-to-human heart transplant was a Muslim.
Doctors transplant a pig heart into a human.
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