Two-legged Siamese twins Indonesia's first
Two-legged Siamese twins Indonesia's first
JAKARTA (JP): Mujito and Eka, who died Saturday night, were
the country's first Siamese twins born with only one pair of
legs, the chairman of the Indonesian Medical Association, Azrul
Azwar, said yesterday.
"Previously, I have never heard of two-legged Siamese born in
this country and such births rarely occur in the world," Azrul
said. "Conjoined twins are quite common when a single fertilized
egg fails to divide fully into separate twins during the
gestation period."
Apart from two perfect heads, Mujito and Eka had separate
lungs, spinal cords and stomach but shared a single heart, liver,
genitals, a pair of legs and arms.
Azrul told The Jakarta Post that connections at the chest,
buttocks and head were common for Siamese twins in Indonesia.
He said Indonesia lacked facilities to deal with Siamese twins
joined from the waist down.
Born to a low-income family, the twins would have burdened
their family and experienced psychological strain as they grew
up, he said.
Life magazine reported similar births in Russia and the United
States.
In 1950, Masha and Dasha were born in Moscow with two
perfectly good legs and a vestigial third leg. They had separate
stomachs and upper intestines which joined to form a single lower
intestine and rectum. The girls, who were 16 years old when the
magazine published the story, learned to walk when they were
five.
The Hensel twins, Brittany and Abigail, seven years old, live
in America's Midwest. Their parents feared an operation would
endanger the twins' lives.
The twins have two hearts but share a venous system and all
organs below the waist. The Hensels started learning to walk when
they were 15 months old.
Though the circulatory system is interconnected, the Russian
and American twins have separate instincts because their heads
and spinal cords do not connect. Both twins also have a single
set of reproductive organs.
Time magazine reported a similar case when a medical team at
London's Great Ormond Street Children's Hospital attempted to
separate three-year-old Eilish and Katie Holton of Ireland in
1992. Katie died four days later and Eilish lived. (10)