(Reuters) - A 62-year-man with end-stage renal disease has become the first human to receive a new kidney from a genetically edited pig, doctors from the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston announced on Thursday.

The four-hour transplant surgery, performed on March 16, “marks a major milestone in the quest to provide more readily available organs to patients,” the hospital said in a statement.

The pig kidney was provided by eGenesis of Cambridge, Massachusetts.

(Reporting by Nancy Lapid; editing by Chizu Nomiyama)