Risk of virus infection in xenotransplantation

The risk of tranferring exogenous pig viruses to man during organ xenotranp lantation can be controlled by keeping the pig donors pathogen-free. A risk of mobilising pig endogenous retroviruses and a "xenozoonosis"-infection i n human organ recipients cannot be excluded according to recently reported virological cell culture experiments. The present state of research, howeve r, does not allow an answer to the question of wether or not a disease migh t be caused by such an infection and wether such a virus might be contagiou s to third persons.