IT·Science News

Pig kidney keeps a US man off dialysis for a record 271 days, then bridges him to a human organ

A genetically modified kidney from a pig called Wilma kept a man with kidney failure alive and off dialysis for a record nine months, then served as a “bridge” to a human transplant for the first time, The Guardian reports. Tim Andrews, 66, from New Hampshire, received the kidney at Massachusetts General Hospital in January 2025. The pig had 69 edits to her genome to reduce the risk of viruses and immune rejection. Details were published in the Lancet.

Andrews had only a 9% chance of getting a human kidney within five years. The pig kidney worked for 271 days before damage to its blood vessels led to failure and removal. After several months back on dialysis, he received a kidney from a dead human donor, which worked well over six months of follow-up.

“I was alive, and I hadn’t been in a long time.” — Tim Andrews, via The Guardian

How each outlet framed it

• The Guardian — the patient and the record: Andrews could cook, vacuum and walk his dog again, and the first pig kidney transplant into a living person, in 2024, ended after 52 days when the patient died of unrelated heart problems.
• NBC News — the scale of need: more than 100,000 people are on the US transplant waiting list, most of them for a kidney. Lead author Dr Leonardo Riella told both outlets that “the organ shortage is the greatest crisis we have right now in transplantation”.

What we don't know yet: whether pig kidneys can last long enough to be a permanent treatment. NBC notes this is a single patient’s case and that long-term safety and durability are unproven.