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First Baby Born After Deceased Womb Transplant (bbc.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the medical-milestone dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: A healthy baby girl has been born using a womb transplanted from a dead person. The 10-hour transplant operation -- and later fertility treatment -- took place in Sao Paulo, Brazil, in 2016. The mother, 32, was born without a womb. There have been 39 womb transplants using a live donor, including mothers donating their womb to their daughter, resulting in 11 babies. But the 10 previous transplants from a dead donor have failed or resulted in miscarriage. In this case, reported in The Lancet, the womb donor was a mother of three in her mid-40s who died from bleeding on the brain. The recipient reportedly had Mayer-Rokitansky-Kuster-Hauser syndrome, which affects about one in every 4,500 women and results in the vagina and uterus (womb) failing to form properly.

The baby girl was delivered by Caesarean section on December 15, 2017, weighing 6 pounds (2.5kg).

19 of 43 comments (clear)

  1. Could vs. Should by rmdingler · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Perhaps and only maybe this is one of those things that we do without a great amount of consideration if we should?!?!

    I know the earth is critically short of humans, but marketing dead wombs to people with broken wombs seems a bit macabre... how does the doc begin that conversation?

    --
    Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

    Ernest Hemingway

    1. Re:Could vs. Should by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Perhaps and only maybe this is one of those things that we do without a great amount of consideration if we should?!?!

      Perhaps you should not be so judgemental. The mother and baby are both doing fine, so no harm was done. Medical knowledge was advanced.

      Individuals should be allowed to own and control their own bodies, and make their own informed decisions. It is none of your business.

      marketing dead wombs to people with broken wombs seems a bit macabre

      This is the very first successful procedure, so I doubt if any "marketing" was done.

    2. Re:Could vs. Should by rmdingler · · Score: 1, Interesting

      Perhaps you should not be so judgemental. The mother and baby are both doing fine, so no harm was done.

      Perhaps. Yet, perhaps, three babies were autumn born to a mother who had access to resources that could only provide for the mother and one offspring this year... many maternal mammals have to choose a child to save, and two to recycle, to make the harsh winter.

      Perhaps the harsh winter is upon the humans and they're not quite aware of it as their lowly cousins.

      --
      Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

      Ernest Hemingway

    3. Re:Could vs. Should by hai_Priesty · · Score: 1

      Seconded.

      And part of me thinks /. is supposedly a site of nerds. Why can't people just congratulate a medical breakthrough (or miracle for the mother/child) instead of degenerating into female-part slurs, crude corpse jokes and hurling "overpopulation" flamebaits against people for having a child within the first 15 posts?

    4. Re:Could vs. Should by Aighearach · · Score: 1

      When you have a moronic headline like that, you're begging for corpse jokes.

      What the fuck makes you think that nerds didn't always love corpse jokes? You didn't realize how popular Frankenstein is, apparently.

      Look, most organ transplants involve moving organs from recently-deceased people, to currently-living people. At least, outside of China this is usually true. And the headlines talk about "first success at [some specific organ] transplant," the headlines don't say, "first deceased heart transplant," "first deceased face transplant," "first deceased penis transplant," etc. They just say first transplant.

      If you're worried about things like, "why are people denigrating female parts?" you might want to start with, "why is the media all over the world saying 'deceased womb' in the first place?"

    5. Re:Could vs. Should by quenda · · Score: 1

      I know the earth is critically short of humans, but marketing dead wombs to people with broken wombs seems a bit macabre... how does the doc begin that conversation?

      How is that any different to a kidney transplant?

    6. Re:Could vs. Should by hai_Priesty · · Score: 1

      Sigh. I agree with your assessment about the most of the media themselves being click-baits. Dead-Check. Female body part- Check.

      People since before Frankenstein has been amused with corpses - Victorians were obsessed with death; see Edgar Allan Poe popularity. It's only recent decades that taking about death (when people stopped dying in large numbers with gruesome ways in Dicken-esque factories and unsafe environments) becomes socially impolite while taking about vag cease being so.

      Perhaps better rephrase comment as -
      Individuals can make all the jokes one likes, just musing that the overall proportion of people caring about the factual details or serious medical discussion looks way off - No one seems to care about it being medical breakthrough (0 comments when I posted), or recognizing it as something miraculous for the said woman and child (0) vs people just wanting to make corpse and dry vag jokes (tons and tons).

    7. Re:Could vs. Should by PPH · · Score: 1

      It is none of your business.

      Perhaps not. It was Brazil and they can do what they want with their public healthcare funds.

      --
      Have gnu, will travel.
    8. Re:Could vs. Should by PPH · · Score: 1

      You die without the function of a kidney. It boils down to the economics of lifetime of dialysis vs a transplant. To save a life.

      --
      Have gnu, will travel.
    9. Re:Could vs. Should by serviscope_minor · · Score: 1

      I know the earth is critically short of humans, but marketing dead wombs to people with broken wombs seems a bit macabre... how does the doc begin that conversation?

      Most organs are transplanted from dead people because most organs are critical to the life of the person owing them.

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
    10. Re:Could vs. Should by zmooc · · Score: 1

      This is not true. We transplant eye parts, skin, faces, arms, legs, fingers, penises and many other parts. None of those are critical to life. They just help restore some bodily function, just like a womb transplant does.

      --
      0x or or snor perron?!
    11. Re:Could vs. Should by rmdingler · · Score: 1

      Spot on... is that you, mum?

      --
      Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

      Ernest Hemingway

    12. Re:Could vs. Should by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      You could make the same argument about most transplants. Do we need to give people new hearts and new livers, or should we just let them die because there are plenty more humans. All the effort put in to hand transplants, when prosthetic ones are pretty good now.

      All kinds of medical treatments too. Do men really need plastic surgery when they have bits removed for prostate cancer? They can live perfectly fine with one ball, just a bit lop sided.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  2. This is crazy by AndyKron · · Score: 1

    Damn. I'd rather adopt or find a surrogate mother. This is crazy.

  3. media sensationalism by SuperDre · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Hmmm.. so it's a womb that was taken from a deadperson, than later the woman who got the womb got pregnant and delivered a baby.. That makes it a tad bit different than the initial headline might suggest, as I thought it was a pregnant lady that died and they had transplanted the womb including the baby into the other woman and then delivered the baby.. that would make the story quite different.

  4. Why? Mom's Feelings? by kackle · · Score: 1

    I applaud the scientists/medical people involved, but can't help to think, in this over-populated world, with lots of unwanted babies and orphans, that all the medical efforts could have been better spent on relieving widespread human suffering. They say half of us will get cancer, for example.

    And I thought I read somewhere that such a procedure costs ~ $250,000.

  5. Re:Why? Mom's Feelings? by dmatos · · Score: 1

    So you think the pain of not being able to conceive doesn't count as human suffering? A woman who desperately wants to have a child, but is medically unable? Not very compassionate of you, there.

    As far as curing cancer goes - are you working towards that? What contributions have you made to eliminating cancer? The truth of the matter is that different doctors have different specialties, and they work within those disciplines.

    --

    It may look like I'm doing nothing, but I'm actively waiting for my problems to go away.
    --Scott Adams
  6. Uterus not womb by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    The womb isn't a body part. They transplanted her uterus. Let's use the real words not pretty little euphemisms.

  7. Re:Why? Mom's Feelings? by kackle · · Score: 1

    So you think the pain of not being able to conceive doesn't count as human suffering? A woman who desperately wants to have a child, but is medically unable? Not very compassionate of you, there.

    I said "widespread". No, I don't equate few women's "lack of choice" to millions of people suffering/dying globally every year.

    As far as curing cancer goes - are you working towards that? What contributions have you made to eliminating cancer? The truth of the matter is that different doctors have different specialties, and they work within those disciplines.

    I can/have only donate money at this point. I see your point, but, again, I think those overlapping medical specialties could have been better applied. "Womb transplant expertise" requires some of our smartest people, for many years, but helps so few.