Rare twist of fate: Twins born a year apart from each other

(Representational image)

New Delhi: When we see identical twins or hear the words, we automatically take it to mean siblings who share a birth date and year. But what are the odds of twins being born on separate days and years? Extremely rare.

Not for Joaquin and Aitana de Jesus Ontiveros, though. The Ontiveros twins were expected to arrive on January 27, 2018, however, in a turn of events, their mother went into premature labour on New Year's Eve.

The twins arrived early and were born 20 minutes apart – but in different years.

While Joaquin arrived on 11:58 pm on December 31, 2017, his sister was born at 12:16 am on January 1, 2018.

Identical twins are known to be born at a rate of almost four per 1000 births across the globe, but such cases are very rare.

Last year, only four such twin births were recorded in the US.