Objectively speaking, there are still differences on the conclusion that "the world's first head transplant experiment was successfully implemented". Some medical experts questioned that "surgery should refer to surgery performed on a living body, but in fact it is anatomy or anatomical research on the remains."
But in any case, the head transplant experiment is expressed in a popular way, and its ultimate direction should be "head change" as most people understand. China novels such as Strange Tales from a Lonely Studio, modern sci-fi movies and large-scale magic shows all contain the concept or scene of "head-changing". Whether in legends or sci-fi movies, changing the head represents a supreme "technology", which also takes care of the difficulties in reality.
To some extent, the change of head may represent an ultimate fantasy of human beings about immortality and corpse disposal. But if people's heads can be changed at will, this day will really come, but it may not be as beautiful as we thought.
From a legal point of view, the real head-changing operation must be carried out on a living body, so what kind of legal risks and responsibilities should the implementer bear? What is the essential difference between taking off a fresh head and "decapitation" in the general sense? Furthermore, do individuals have the right to give others the right to take uncertain and irreversible risks in their lives? Today, euthanasia has not yet achieved the popularization of legal knowledge, and its controversy is believed to be considerable. In addition, the replacement of head and body also constitutes a direct challenge to the uniqueness of personality and identity. These are all related to the boundaries of medical innovation defined by law.
This assumption is too far from reality, but head replacement surgery can really become a reality. For such ethical risks, we have to plan ahead and be alert in advance. In the world medical field, there are also many voices calling Canavero a "criminal".
Every major technological progress in modern medicine is accompanied by challenges to the existing social ethics, laws and "body view", and some new concepts or technologies are often "shocking" from the beginning. In this sense, it is rigorous enough to completely deny the future of head change with today's ethics. However, in the face of so many ethical disputes, legal ambiguity and unknown risks, we should be cautious about such experiments. After all, this is related to the redefinition of "person" and body, and the balance of ethical risks in surgery should be more than the technical "safety" consideration to some extent.
Finally, I have to think about why China is the first choice for this "breakthrough" operation. Is it because of technological advantages or because our society lacks enough ethics (including social ethics and medical ethics) to restrain and standardize?
We noticed that up to now, the health authorities have not made a statement about this surgical experiment. It is necessary to give more tolerance and space to scientific exploration, but the basic ethical norms that scientific research must follow should not be missing. Although the National Health and Family Planning Commission issued the Measures for Ethical Review of Biomedical Research Involving People, at present, head replacement is only carried out on the remains, which is beyond the scope of the Measures, which also puts forward a new topic for the construction of medical ethics in China.