PERU: PERU'S RARE MERMAID BABY IS SCEDULED FOR SPARATION SURGERY

Record ID: 853705

  • Title: PERU: PERU'S RARE MERMAID BABY IS SCEDULED FOR SPARATION SURGERY
  • Date: 1st February 2005
  • Summary: MCU (Spanish) GIRL'S FATHER RICARDO SERRON, SAYING: "This is a very difficult time. I keep thinking about what's going to happen and how's the operation going to be, if the operation is going to come out well or if it will be difficult. For me, this is very difficult."
  • Embargoed: 16th February 2005 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: LIMA, PERU
  • City:
  • Country: Peru
  • Topics: Health,Science
  • Reuters ID: LVADTWTH0JY6MFK4XZYO4CPT30OO
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  • Story Text: Peru's rare mermaid baby, born with fused legs, is scheduled for separation surgery.
    A Peruvian baby dubbed the "Little Mermaid" because she was born with a rare condition in which her legs are fused, will have surgery this month to try to separate them, doctors said.
    Nine-month-old Milagros Cerron -- her name means miracles in Spanish -- is one of only a handful of the estimated 1-in-60,000 to 100,000 people born with sirenomelia, or mermaid syndrome, to have lived more than a few hours, experts say.
    For Luis Rubio, the doctor leading the Peruvian team that will cut her legs apart in Lima on February 24, the past year has been a crash course in tackling a condition he had read about in textbooks but never expected to have to treat.
    Doctors believe there may only be one other surviving "mermaid" -- 16-year-old American Tiffany Yorks, whose legs were separated when she was a few months old.
    Experts say sirenomelia is about as rare as conjoined twins but is nearly always fatal because most sufferers lack kidneys or have other complications.
    "Sirenomelia is very rare," said Doctor Rubio, "so much so that there are only three cases in the world that that have survived to date. One of these is this case here in Peru. These children usually die before they're 7-days-old."
    From the waist up, Milagros smiles and babbles like any healthy infant. Below the waist, her stomach merges seamlessly into her legs, which are joined all the way to her heels.
    With her tiny feet splayed in a 'V', the impression of a mermaid's forked tail is complete.
    The bones of both legs are visible and move separately.
    Doctor Rubio took on Milagros' case when she was two days old and is treating her in a City Hall-funded mobile "solidarity hospital" run out of old buses in a poor northern district of Lima.
    Milagros' father, 24-year-old Ricardo Cerron, appealed for aid when she was born on April 27, 2004, in the Andean town of Huancayo, around 200 miles (300 km) east of Lima.
    "I keep thinking about what's going to happen and how's the operation going to be," he said, "if the operation is going to come out well or if it will be difficult. For me, this is very difficult."
    Milagros, who weighs 17 lbs (7.5 kg) and is 24 inches (60 cm) long, has a rudimentary anus, urethra and genitalia all located together.
    Her legs have separate cartilage, bones and blood supplies, and she has one good kidney. Her heart and lungs are fine.
    Doctors will insert three silicone bags filled with saline solution between her legs on February 9 and gradually add liquid to stretch the skin to cover exposed wounds once they are cut apart, centimetre by centimetre.
    "My dream is that everything is going to turn out well and that she will continue accompanying me," said Milagros' 19-year-old mother Sara Arauco.
    The surgery is very risky, however.
    Tiffany Yorks who lives in Florida, walked for six years after separation surgery but is currently wheelchair-bound after an accident. Her doctor, who helped pioneer the separation technique, said he did not know of any current survivor besides Tiffany.
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