/ 1 January 2002

Baby boy with two heads born to Brazilian teen

A 14-year-old girl in southeastern Brazil gave birth to a boy with two heads, doctors and media said.

The child, weighing 3,5 kilogrammes, was born by Caesarean section on Tuesday in the town of Ataleia, about 700 kilometres northeast of Rio, the Globo TV network reported on Wednesday.

Mother and child were transferred to the Clinics Hospital in Belo Horizonte, where doctors found that the boy had one heart, one liver and one set of lungs, but two heads, two spines and two esophagi, Globo said.

”I believe there are two children, because there are two heads and two separate brains,” Dr. Jose Sabino de Oliveira, director of the hospital’s pediatric intensive care unit, said in a televised interview. He said it was not clear whether they could be surgically separated.

”The child is healthy and can survive,” said Dr. Marcos Burle de Aguiar of the Brazilian Medical Society. The mother’s identity was not released because of her age. Calls to the hospital were not answered. – Sapa-AP