Surgeons removed a genetically engineered pig’s kidney from an Alabama woman after she experienced acute organ rejection, NYU Langone Health officials said on Friday. Towana Looney, 53, lived with the kidney for 130 days, which is longer than anyone else has tolerated an organ from a genetically modified animal. She has resumed dialysis, hospital officials said. Dr. Robert Montgomery, Ms. Looney’s surgeon and the director of the NYU Langone Transplant Institute, said that the so-called explant was not a setback for the field of xenotransplantation — the effort to use organs from animals to replace those that have failed in humans. “This is the longest one of these organs has lasted,” he said in an interview, adding that Ms. Looney had other medical conditions that might have complicated her prognosis.
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