Siamese twins at 3, apart but still so close . . .

THEY were born face to face, gazing into each other’s eyes.

And looking at Rosie and Ruby Formosa almost three years later, you could be forgiven for thinking nothing much has changed.

But the twin sisters, once joined at the abdomen and sharing intestines before a life-or-death operation to separate them, can now lead independent lives.

It’s just that they barely ever choose to be apart.

‘They are almost inseparable,’ their mother Angela, 34, said yesterday. ‘Wherever they are, they need to know where the other is.’

The conjoined twins were given a low chance of survival after being delivered at 34 weeks by caesarean at University College Hospital, London, weighing just 5lb 3oz each.

Next day, a 15- strong team at Great Ormond Street Hospital spent five hours separating them and carrying out a further life-saving operation to clear a blocked intestine. Conjoined twins occur once i n every 200,000 births, but two-thirds are stillborn or die soon afterwards.

Yet against these overwhelming odds, Rosie and Ruby triumphed. Now the girls like to play together and wear matching clothes – and are preparing to celebrate their third birthday with their mother, their 39-year-old taxi-driver father Daniel, and their sister Lily, seven.

Mrs Formosa, from Bexleyheath, Kent, said: ‘They have both developed as any “normal” child does.’

Still inseparable: Ruby (left) and her sister like to wear matching clothes

Let’s play! Rosie (left) and Ruby are now healthy, happy toddlers

High risk: Before their operation