Thirteen-month-old Milagros Cerron was stable, awake and taking in liquids 15 hours after doctors, in a nationally televised surgery, separated her fused legs in the second such successful operation on record to correct a rare deformity known as "mermaid syndrome."
The lead physician said Cerron's 11-surgeon medical team believes she could be walking within two years, but cautioned the bright-eyed girl will need years of surgery to reconstruct her internal organs.
"In accordance with the anatomic findings that we have encountered, it is possible that she will walk," Dr. Luis Rubio told reporters late Wednesday. "There is extraordinary capillary flow. The reflexes are now independently evident in each foot."
The girl -- whose name means "miracles" -- was born with her legs fused together from her thighs to her ankles inside a seamless sack of skin and fat.
Rubio said Tiffany Yorks, a 16-year-old American girl was the only other person known to have undergone a successful surgery to correct the rare congenital defect, which occurs in one out of every 70,000 births and is almost always fatal within days of birth.
He said there is a third person in Asia who suffers from the deformity, which is known as sirenomelia. But he did not provide details or identify that individual.
Doctors had planned to begin correcting Milagros' deformity by separating her legs up to her knees. But the 4 1/2 hour, pre-dawn surgery Wednesday progressed better than the medical team had expected and they were able to seperate the entire length of her legs.
Milagros' father, Ricardo Cerron, 24, broke into tears as Rubio made the first incision. Her mother, Sara Arauco, 20, put her hand to her mouth. A nurse standing behind her chair put her hands on Arauco's shoulders as tears welled up in her eyes.
During the first 90 minutes of the surgery, Rubio granted several live interviews on Peru's Tuesday late-night newscasts. He provided a running commentary on the operation's progress as he and the other surgeons carefully cut through bone and muscle, cauterizing blood vessels along the way to control bleeding.
They removed four silicone bags inserted months earlier to make Milagros' skin more pliable.
The first sign the surgery was going well came 30 minutes into the procedure, when Rubio announced that they could cut past a major artery that had connected both legs without performing a complicated bypass.
At midnight, they separated Milagros' fused heels, and for a little more than an hour continued upward, slowly separating the legs toward the child's groin.
Her parted limbs were gaping wounds, but the ghastly appearance was quickly transformed as the medical team stitched the pre-stretched skin around each leg.
Just before 3am, Rubio held up the girl's legs in a V-shape, displaying the line of stitches extending up from her heels to her inner thighs.
"This is the final result that we have come to in this extraordinary surgical intervention," he announced. "This surgical intervention has been a true success."
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese