The stuff of science fiction is only months from becoming reality, but it would have been sooner if not for a glitch.
The Italian neurosurgeon planning the world's first head transplant says there's a change in the patient. Dr. Sergio Canavero now says he will not perform the operation on a Russian man he's been treating for almost two years. Instead, the surgery will be done in China, on a patient who has not been chosen yet.
The Russian man suffers from a muscle-wasting disease. The publisher of the media company handling the surgeon's press relations says the head transplant will be done in China because, quote, "It's much easier to get a Chinese donor." The surgeon says the first human head transplant will happen within ten months.
Critics have questioned the procedure because the science behind it is a closely held secret. Naysayers believe technology is not capable of transplanting a head yet. Source: Newsweek