clipped from: ca.news.yahoo.com   
AFP

Bangladesh surgeons battle to save conjoined twins


Bangladeshi conjoined twins rest in a hospital in Chittagong on July 4. Bangladeshi surgeons were battling Sunday to save twins born joined at the stomach and legs.  Photo:/AFP

The twins -- one male and the other's sex yet to be identified-- were born outside the southeastern Bangladesh port city of Chittagong on Saturday and were taken to Chittagong Medical College hospital by their chemist father.


"They are joined in the stomach and legs. One is male and has visible sexual organs. But they don't have any anus or developed organs to urinate," hospital's paediatric surgeon Tahmina Banu told AFP.


"The twins cannot be saved if we don't operate them urgently and create system for passing stool and urine," she said.


"If they survive now, we'll think of separating them six months to one year later," he said.


"But it would be too risky," he added.


Four previous operations in Bangladesh to separate conjoined twins in the past four years have resulted in the deaths of all but two children.


The twins survived an initial operation in the Australian city.