Formerly conjoined twins ready for home

PALO ALTO, Calif., Jan. 24 (UPI) -- Two-year-old twins Yurelia and Fiorella Rocha-Arias are going home to Costa Rica after surgeries to separate them, it was reported Wednesday.

The girls, who were born joined at the chest and abdomen, underwent multiple surgeries at Stanford University's Lucile Packard Children's Hospital last year, the San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News said.

They are fully recovered, the newspaper said.

"I feel very happy and content," their mother Maria Elizabeth Arias said Tuesday at a news conference. "My girls were born anew in this hospital."

The twins were brought to the United States by Mending Kids International, which paid for their transportation and housing. The hospital paid for their treatment, which was estimated to cost up to $2 million.