When David Bennett Sr. received a pig heart transplant, it was the first surgery of its kind. Xenotransplantation is when tissues or organs are transplanted from a nonhuman species into a human. Bennett’s extraordinary operation, while the first of its kind, is the most recent example.

Today, in The Conversation Canada, Françoise Baylis and Andrew Fenton of Dalhousie University write about how we assign moral value to the animals that serve as organ and tissue donors. The first heart xenotransplantations used chimpanzee and baboon hearts. Pigs, who we view as food animals, may have a different moral value as we are used to viewing them as fit for human consumption. While xenotransplantation is considered a potential solution to the organ shortage, Baylis and Fenton write that “there is good reason to look for other strategies to increase the supply of organs for transplantation.”

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