A kidney transplanted to Petty Officer of the Kuzbass sub

An operation to transplant a kidney to Senior Petty Officer Pyotr Shatailo assigned to the Kuzbass submarine has been successfully performed in Kuzbass, the Kemerovo region /a coal-mining centre in southern Siberia/.

Medics of the first regional hospital, where the pre-operation preparations and the operation were carried out and where the rehabilitation after the surgery has lasted for two months, assess his condition as satisfactory.

Pyotr Shatailo was assigned to the Kuzbass submarine of the Russian Pacific Fleet, whose maintenance is sponsored by the Kemerovo region. In 1998 the submarine caught fire, exposing the crew to a serious danger. Thanks to the timely action of Petty Officer Shatailo, the fire was extinguished. The crew and the man-of-war were saved. However, the petty officer was poisoned by combustion products, which badly affected his kidneys.

Captain 1st rank Sergei Zakharchenko, the captain of the nuclear submarine, filed a request to Kemerovo Governor Aman Tuleyev to render financial assistance to the submariner who needed an expensive surgery, and the regional administration did find the funds.

Such a surgery costs about 40,000 dollars abroad, while its price in Russia is only slightly lower.