LONDON - Dr Christiaan Barnard, the pioneering but boastful South African surgeon who performed the world's first heart transplant, died yesterday in Cyprus, reportedly while reading one of his own books.
In a final twist of irony, the 78-year-old surgeon died the way he had once said he would chose -
of a heart attack.
Barnard, born in Beaufort, South Africa, the son of a missionary, led a life as colourful as it was celebrated.
After he performed the world's first heart transplant in 1967, he was thrust into a limelight so bright that the Guinness Book of Records once estimated that he received more fan mail than anyone else.
On December 3 that year, he transplanted a heart into 53-year-old Louis Washkansky at Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town who lived for 18 days.
Barnard was unperturbed by the resulting controversy.
Barnard was an outspoken campaigner against apartheid, once giving a talk to the South African Chamber of Commerce entitled "Why we deserve to be called Nazis".
After his retirement he became a farmer, writer and traveller.
Yesterday tributes poured in from around the world including one from former South African President Nelson Mandela who described his death as "a great loss to the country after all the contributions he made.
He was also very vocal against apartheid".
Barnard, who fathered six children with three wives and boasted of sexual conquests including actress Gina Lollobrigida, was holidaying alone when he died.
- INDEPENDENT
