A BABY WITH TWO FACES, FOUR ARMS, AND FOUR LEGS WAS BORN IN INDIA
A baby with a rare congenital anomaly, a variation of Siamese twins, was recently born in India.
The male infant, in addition to the usual two arms and legs, had two additional underdeveloped legs and arms growing from his abdomen, and one head with two faces featuring distorted features.
The newborn lived only a few hours before passing away. It is reported that he could not drink milk, likely due to associated physical anomalies that were incompatible with life.
The staff at the hospital in Sitapur, Uttar Pradesh, were shocked as this was the first time they had seen such an anomaly and described it as a “one-of-a-kind phenomenon.”
The birth of the unusual baby quickly became known throughout the area, and villagers from the area where the mother—38-year-old Rama Devi—was admitted to the hospital came in large numbers to see the “miraculous child,” as they called him.
Rama Devi was unaware of the developmental abnormalities in her child; she was from a poor community and had not undergone prenatal check-ups.
In medicine, this anomaly is called diprosopus—a rare form of Siamese twins where the face or parts of the face, and sometimes limbs, are duplicated. The child typically has only one brain. Only about 2 such children are born for every million live births, and most die shortly after birth.
