Blaiberg survived the operation, and continued with his life for 19 months and 15 days before dying from heart complications on 17 August 1969.
In World War II, Blaiberg joined the South African Army Medical Corps and served in the dental unit in Ethiopia and Italy.
With the assistance of his brother Marius and 30 others, Dr. Christiaan Barnard performed the nine-hour operation on Louis Washkansky, a 55-year-old man suffering from diabetes and heart disease.
[5] With the transplanted heart from Denise Darvall, a victim of a road accident, Washkansky was able to survive the operation and lived for 18 days before dying of pneumonia.
[6] Blaiberg received the heart from 24-year-old Clive Haupt, a coloured man who had collapsed on a Cape Town beach the day before.
The heart is merely a blood-pumping machine and whether it comes from a white, black or coloured man - or a baboon or giraffe, for that matter - has no relevance to the issue of race relations in the political or ideological context.
[10] In June 1968, Blaiberg contracted hepatitis while undergoing routine tests in South Africa's Groote Schuur Hospital.