Now they want to transplant a head

SURGEONS hope to perform the world’s first head transplant – and a head has been offered.

Here’s the cast of characters: Valery Spiridonov, 31: a Russian tech geek who runs an educational software company from his home east of Moscow.

Because he has Werdnig-Hoffmann disease, a genetic disorder that wastes muscles and motor neurons, he is physically capable of little beyond feeding himself, steering his wheelchair with a joystick, and typing. Doctors expected him to be dead by now.

Xiaoping Ren, 55: Chinese surgeon who, when he lived in the US, was on the team who per- formed the first successful hand transplant. He practised for it by switching pigs’ forelegs, and he keeps in his office a bronzed pig ear that the transplant team sent him as a trophy.

Sergio Canavero, 51: Shaven-headed, flamboyant Italian neurosurgeon who compares himself with Dr Frankenstein, mentions Nazi doctor Josef Mengele and has written not only dozens of respected scientific papers, but also a guide to seducing women. In 2013, he announced he wanted to try to transplant a human head.

You see where this is going, right? Canavero and Ren want to perform the world’s first head transplant, and Spiridonov has volunteered for it.

Sam Kean’s story about the project, published in the Atlantic magazine, is deeply weird. Canavero says the transplant could be performed as early as next year and has a “90 percent-plus” chance of success. If it does take place, it would require 80 surgeons and cost tens of millions of dollars.

Many scientists and ethicists have derided the project as “junk science”. One view is that if Spiridonov dies the doctors should be prosecuted for murder.

The story raises interesting questions, such as: Who would the surviving patient be – Spiridonov or an amalgam? – The Washington Post