The Curse of the Mermaid

With her legs fused together like a tail, Milagros Cerron has one of the rarest birth abnormalities in the world: sirenomelia, or 'mermaid syndrome'. Can an operation by charismatic but controversial plastic surgeon Dr Luis Rubio, to be broadcast live on national television, save this little Peruvian girl? The story of the operation and the attendant media circus is a revealing look at what happens when medicine, politics, religion and superstition collide in a poor and struggling country.