Conjoined twin girls successfully separated by surgeons at just eight days old

The girls are thought to be the smallest and youngest babies to be separated anywhere in the world

Lydia, left, and Maya before the successful operation to separate them at eight days old in Bern, Switzerland (EPA)

Conjoined twin girls have been successfully separated by surgeons at just eight days old in a complex operation to save their lives.

The girls, who together weighed just 2.2kg (4lb 12oz), are thought to be the smallest and youngest babies to be separated anywhere in the world. Surgeons in Switzerland carried out the operation even though it was judged to have only a 1 per cent chance of success.

Lydia and Maya were joined at the liver when they were born in December, with another sister, eight weeks premature.

The conjoined girls were seriously ill as “a very great amount of blood flowed from one child to the other through the liver”, Hôpitaux Universitaires de Genève said. “One child had too much blood and blood pressure that was much too high, while the other child did not receive enough blood and had blood pressure that was too low,” it said.

The two girls are now breast-feeding and putting on weight, and their sister is also doing well.