Mail & Guardian
Mail & Guardian

Christiaan Barnard

latest news & developments
In the Heart of Cape Town Museum at Groote Schuur Hospital, wax figurines recreate the first human-to-human heart transplant, performed by Christiaan Bernard. (Jay Caboz)
CAPE TOWN

Anatomy of a hospital: Groote Schuur in a time of budget and staffing cuts

From porters to engineers, hospital staff navigate chronic underfunding and staffing shortages while maintaining world-class care at one of South Africa’s most storied medical…

  • Sean Christie
18 min read
This Sound Africa podcast investigates the persistent rumour that a black man named Hamilton Naki played a much bigger role in the first heart transplant surgery than he is given credit for. (Image: Sound Africa)
CHRISTIAAN BARNARD

PODCAST: The heart problem

The first ever heart transplant in the world was performed in South Africa in 1967. But did Dr Christiaan Barnard deserve all the credit?

  • Rasmus Bitsch
  • Sound Africa
1 min read
Christiaan Barnard was part of the Afrikaans literary movement known as Die Sestigers
CHRISTIAAN BARNARD

Chris Barnard hailed as a ‘patriot’

The South African Civic Organisation has paid tribute to the Afrikaans author and scriptwriter for using his writing to denounce the "evil apartheid."

  • Catherine Rice
2 min read
BONITAS

Highest accolade for local cardiologist

South Africa staked a claim to world-class expertise in cardiology since the moment the heart started to beat in the chest of Louis Washkansky.

  • Sponsored Feature
3 min read
CHRISTIAAN BARNARD

My surgeon’s heart

MOVIE OF THE WEEK: Percy Zvomuya reviews Hidden Heart, documentary about Chris Barnard and his assistant, Hamilton Naki.

  • Percy Zvomuya
3 min read
CAPE TOWN HOSPITAL

The day medical history was rewritten

Nearly forty years ago, in the middle of the night at a Cape Town hospital, South African surgeon Christiaan Barnard rewrote medical history when he carried out the first-ever…

  • Charlotte Plantive
3 min read