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Pigs are born with several strains of porcine endogenous retrovirus (PERV)
lurking in their DNA, and there are good reasons to fear that the virus could
infect humans when pig organs are transplanted into people. The
immunosuppressive drugs given to patients also make infection more likely. So
the US Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta is patenting a way of detecting
PERV infections (WO 00/00829). With the help of infected human cells, the centre
has produced a test that can detect an immune response to PERVs. Tests on 160
patients given porcine cell transplants revealed no signs of infection.