Are pig organs the future of transplantation? 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Every Living Creature shares hopeful view of xenotransplantation Using xenotransplantation, doctors could one day have enough genetically engineered organs from pigs for patients in need. By Meghan Rosen March 17, 2026 at 10:00 am Share this:Share Share via email (Opens in new window) Email Share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Facebook Share on Reddit (Opens in new window) Reddit Share on X (Opens in new window) X Print (Opens in new window) Print Listen to this article This is a human-written story voiced by AI. Got feedback? Take our survey . (See our AI policy here .) Every Living CreatureJoschua D. MezrichThe MIT Press, $29.95 Today, more than 100,000 people in the United States are waiting for an organ transplant. They’re seeking kidneys, livers, hearts and lungs — organs from human donors that could give these patients a second chance at life. But every year, nearly 5,000 people on the national transplant list die waiting. There’s a future, though, in which no one needs to wait — when doctors have enough organs for every patient who needs one. These organs will come from genetically engineered pigs, and they could be even better than the ones we’re born with: resistant to cancer and infection and able to tolerate extreme temperatures and pressures. In this future, drones might zip through the sky ferrying bespoke pig organs directly to surgeons waiting to plug them into patients’ bodies. Sign up for our newsletter We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday. “This may sound far-fetched and futuristic, but it really isn’t,” writes transplant surgeon Joshua Mezrich. His new book, Every Living Creature, chronicles the history of xenotransplantation, the practice of moving organs or tissues from one species into the body of another. If doctors can get it to work, xenotransplantation could one day help meet a critical need, increasing the number of organs available for transplant. That’s the case Mezrich makes, anyway. Amidst the rosy view of a xenotransplantation’s future, he gets serious with the science. This is a book that plunges readers into the vast sea of transplant-related immunology. It offers crash courses in genetics and history and the ethics of using animals to grow organs for humans. It introduces a wide and revolving cast of characters in the field: surgeons and scientists, patients and funders. At times, the story can feel like a whirlwind, whisking readers across decades and from lab to lab and surgery to surgery. But at its core, Every Living Creature is a book about hope. It’s about doctors with the single-mindedness and perseverance to keep going when the idea of putting pig organs inside living humans seemed impossible. It’s about patients who endure months and years of daily dialysis waiting for a kidney. It’s about people who desperately need a new heart but are too sick to be put on the list and people whose organs are persistently problematic but not problematic enough to qualify for a new one. This is also a story about the courageous people who volunteer for experimental surgeries. People like David Bennett, the 57-year-old Maryland man who received a pig heart in 2022. Or 58-year-old Lawrence Faucette, also from Maryland, who underwent a similar operation in 2023. These men were the first to have genetically engineered pig hearts transplanted into their bodies. Bennett survived for two months after the surgery, Faucette for nearly six weeks. Both patients who knew full well that their xenotransplants probably wouldn’t extend their lives for the long-term. But they signed up anyway because they hoped doctors could learn enough from their cases to help future patients. Stories like these lend Mezrich’s book emotiona
Are pig organs the future of transplantation?
