Conjoined twins Abandoned in India

A nurse cares for conjoined twins at the intensive care unit (ICU) of All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in New Delhi on Sunday. The 36-day-old twins whose parents have abandoned them, have separate heads, chest, heart, stomachs, but their liver, bladder, intestines and genitalia are fused together. The twins share four arms and two legs. Photo: AFP

The 35-day-old twin boys are being looked after by hospital staff in New Delhi's prestigious All Indian Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), the Hindustan Times reported.

The two have separate heads, chest, heart, stomach, lungs and spinal cord but their liver, bladder, intestines and genitalia are fused. They also have just two legs between them, the report said.

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"They are symmetrically fused and both babies are equally healthy," the report quoted D.K. Gupta, additional professor of paediatric surgery at AIIMS, as saying.

Separation surgery was not advisable as "each leg has a separate set of nerves linked to the two independent nervous systems" -- meaning they would have only one leg each on separation, Gupta said.

Separation would also involve complicated liver and intestine surgery and both would have curved spines.

"The surgery would cause extreme deformity," the doctor said.

According to Arbinder Singal, another doctor, the twins' mother saw them only once.