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Aug 19, 2009 11:55 AM | 2
Sorry, folks. No multiple birth records are likely to be broken this month. The Tunisian woman who claimed to be carrying six boys and six girls is unlikely to even be pregnant, a British newspaper reported today.
She has refused to undergo a medical examination and has gone into hiding, The Daily Telegraph reports.
A spokesman for the Tunisan health ministry told the paper, "Our staff interviewed her at length, but even her pregnancy appears to be in her imagination." Although she claims to be nine months pregnant, the ministry says, "there's absolute [sic] nothing about her appearance which indicates this."
A doctor in her hometown of Gafsa, suggested that she was trying to make money from television. "These kind of people can make thousands from appearing on programs," he told the paper.
Earlier this year, Nadya Suleman became the first person to successfully give birth to octuplets who all survived.
Read our Ask the Experts to find out why humans are not adapted to give birth to eight—or a dozen babies.
Image of baby doll courtesy zakwitnij via Flickr
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2 Comments
Add Comment9 months!? Absurd.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSciAm is becoming a tabloid, just scan recent article headlines.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFYI - this article, the dodeca-mom has been reported as a hoax.
The woman is not even pregnant.
So much for verification.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/60-second-science/post.cfm?id=dodeca-mom-could-smash-multiple-bir-2009-08-18&posted=1#comments