March 24, 2026
(Wired) – R3 Bio has a bold idea for replacing lab animals: genetically-engineered whole organ systems that lack a brain. The long-term goal, says a cofounder, is to make human versions. As the Trump administration phases out the use of … Read More
February 27, 2026
(AP) – The vast majority of organ donations once came from people who were brain-dead. Now they’re increasingly coming from people who died when their heart stopped beating, a major shift that can boost transplants but also raises public confusion, … Read More
February 24, 2026
(BBC) – A baby boy has become the first child in the UK to be born using a womb transplanted from a dead donor. Grace Bell, who is in her 30s and was born without a viable womb, says her … Read More
February 9, 2026
(AP) – A Houston doctor has been indicted on charges of falsifying medical records for five patients, making them ineligible to receive a liver transplant, federal prosecutors announced on Thursday. Dr. John Stevenson Bynon Jr. was indicted by a grand … Read More
February 3, 2026
(Reuters via MSN) – A hospital in Barcelona said on Monday it had performed a pioneering facial transplant in which the donor, in a world first, had offered her face for donation before undergoing an assisted dying procedure. The complex … Read More
January 30, 2026
(Nature) – The external, artificial-lung system could be used to treat other people who are critically unwell and awaiting transplants. A 33-year-old man survived for 48 hours without his lungs, after a medical team replaced the organs with an external … Read More
January 23, 2026
(New York Times) – A crackdown on problems with fairness and safety is achieving results, including a big drop in the number of sick patients being passed over for transplants. For years, the nonprofit groups that coordinate transplants in the … Read More
January 14, 2026
(D Magazine) – The funding, part of a new ARPA-H bioprinting initiative, aims to create transplant-ready organs—potentially within hours—using patients’ own cells. UT Southwestern is joining a federal agency and several academic medical centers in an ambitious effort to add … Read More
January 2, 2026
(NYT) – After eight years of training, Dr. Maureen McKiernan made her debut as the lead surgeon on an infant heart transplant — an operation on the edge of what’s possible. After breakfast, she took the A train to NewYork-Presbyterian … Read More
December 29, 2025
(NYT) – International patients can bring a hospital as much as $2 million for a transplant. In recent years, they have typically gotten organs faster than U.S. patients. More than 100,000 people in the United States are in need of … Read More
December 17, 2025
(AP) – Science Corporation, founded by former Neuralink president Max Hodak, has unveiled a prototype machine to extend the life of organs for longer periods. Science Corporation, the brain-computer interface startup founded in 2021 by former Neuralink president Max Hodak, … Read More
December 17, 2025
(AP) – The Gift of Life Donor Program, which serves as the organ procurement network for eastern Pennsylvania, southern New Jersey and Delaware, is supporting the pilot program with a grant of more than $100,000 from its foundation. So far, … Read More
December 11, 2025
(New York Times) – Only four donors have transmitted rabies to organ transplant recipients since 1978, according to federal officials. A man died of rabies after getting a kidney transplant from another man who died of the virus, only the … Read More
December 8, 2025
Hastings Center Report (vol. 55, Issue 5, 2025) is available online by subscription only. Articles include:
November 19, 2025
(The Guardian) – Machine learning model predicts whether donor is likely to die within the timeframe that liver remains viable Recently, in cases where people need a liver transplant, access has been expanded by using donors who die after cardiac … Read More
October 27, 2025
(New York Times) – Tim Andrews, 67, lived with a genetically modified organ longer than any other recipient. Surgeons removed a genetically modified pig kidney from a 67-year-old man last week, nearly nine months after he received the pioneering procedure … Read More
October 27, 2025
Bioethics (vol. 39, no. 8, 2025) is available online by subscription only. Articles include:
October 23, 2025
(Undark) – A dangerous pattern is emerging in media coverage of these topics. A previously expert-driven debate (still far from settled) about the medical and legal frameworks and best practices in end-of-life care is turning into a political exercise in … Read More
October 16, 2025
(The Markup) – For years a race-based medical calculation delayed Black patients access to life-saving kidney transplants The eGFR, or estimated glomerular filtration rate, is an equation that estimates the percentage of kidney function someone has — based on how … Read More
October 10, 2025
(Euro News) – The liver performed key bodily functions, proving that pig organs can temporarily support human life, though serious complications eventually arose. In what researchers are calling a “landmark” in medical science, surgeons implanted a genetically engineered pig liver … Read More
October 8, 2025
(Axios) – The Health and Human Services Department last week ordered the federal organ procurement and transplant network to halt many operations until the government shutdown is over, Axios has learned. Why it matters: Patients will still be able to … Read More
September 22, 2025
(AZ Family) – According to the Donor Network of Arizona, more than 2,500 people removed themselves from the Donor Registry in July. It was the largest single-month removal in the network’s history. The big question is why? The number of … Read More
September 18, 2025
(New York Times) – Federal officials will for the first time fire one of the organizations responsible for coordinating organ donations in the United States, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced on Thursday. It is an escalation in the … Read More
September 16, 2025
(New York Times) – The taboo against pork is deeply entrenched in both religious traditions. But the prohibition is not absolute. It has not always been entirely clear whether the religious prohibitions on pigs apply strictly to consumption, and neither … Read More
September 12, 2025
(Kaiser Health News) – Black, his 22-year-old patient, had arrived at the hospital after getting shot in the head on March 24, 2019. A week later, he was taken to surgery to have his organs removed for donation — even … Read More
