Indian doctors are struggling to save a baby girl born with an external heart which she was holding in one of her hands at the time of her birth. ?The baby has a fully developed external heart between her neck and collar bone,? S.K. Pambhoi, a government doctor, told Reuters yesterday .

Doctors said they separated the hand from the heart, but the baby born to a poor family in Korba town in the central state of Chhattisgarh on Friday would die if she did not have immediate surgery. ?Her heart is connected to the inner body through arteries and veins. Surgery is the best option to insert her heart and fix it at the right place,? Pambhoi said. ?There is a strong possibility of the heart getting infected, so a quick operation is needed.? Doctors said her parents were too poor to afford surgery.