seer wrote:
A 'parisite head' that responds with blinking and smiling?
I have a "problem" with the term "parasite" in cases like this. I don't know, it's just worded wrong...
Note; not directed at you Red, as it seems to be normal to call a person/baby that's not able to support it's own live a parasite even if it's as unusual as this..
In fairness, the term is, as noted in the articles, supposed to apply in cases where it's pretty obvious you don't have a functioning organism whatsoever there -- more like a tumor with (eeeegh) arms or ears or a tangled mass of malformed brain-goop involved.
But meat is messy, and there's a continuum involved. Again usually, if it happens to have a face but the doctors are calling it a 'parasite,' it's because they've determined there's not really much or any real brain behind it; looks can be deceiving. I haven't dug up the pictures for this one, it's Egypt, I'd wonder if they might be taking some semantic leeway in a truly borderline situation, but even that's a messy fact of life.
These cases are getting attention lately because (for real conjoinments, anyway) it's horribly expensive surgery with fair risk, and attracting press helps defray the costs of perfecting what is, y'know, a pretty rare procedure that happens to have a huge impact on a few individuals' (the ones stuck together!) quality of life. More people, more people surviving to breed (and after it), stonkingly better prenatal care, and maybe some extra mutagens here and there (though things like fertility drugs would probably be much more directly involved), and you're probably doomed to see more statistically, but it's still downright rare... The big difference is that, if it happens halfway around the planet, the people are far more likely to find a doctor, and you're far more likely to hear about it. Teh Intarnetweb thing has an infinite number of column inches compared to the daily paper.
If any of you dig these ethical headaches, check out Kenzaburo Oe's
A Personal Matter -- interesting for any number of reasons, especially when you find out what inspired it.