Panda Gets Ground-Breaking Surgery

Chinese eye specialists have removed a cataract from an elderly panda named Basi in the first surgery of its kind, the state-run Xinhua news agency said Wednesday.

"Her eyesight is extremely poor with the right eye going almost blind due to the cataract that started to develop in her right eye five years ago," it said.

Doctors used ultrasonic technology in the 90-minute operation on the 22-year-old giant panda, which weighs 410 pounds. They will know in 15 days if the surgery was a success.

Basi is no ordinary panda. Xinhua said the animal is a "god of longevity." Panda life expectancy is 12 years.

The panda was sedated for the operation by eye doctors in the southeastern coastal city of Fuzhou, Xinhua said.

Xinhua said Basi -- also nicknamed Cutie -- was a "superstar of the animal world" and a nimble weight lifter, basketball player and cyclist, Xinhua said.

She toured the United States for six months in the late 1980s to promote wildlife conservation and "was a great hit on the west coast," said the news agency. She later charmed large audiences at the opening ceremony of the 11th Asian Games hosted by China's capital Beijing in 1990, it said.

But time is taking its toll. The panda also suffers from high blood pressure and nervous diseases, Xinhua said.