Image from NY Daily News showing the extent of Silva’s injuries … and his good luck.

A boy in Brazil has miraculously survived falling from a tree and being impaled by a 2ft iron bar.

Earlier this month, Weverton Silva – a 10-year-old boy from Macaé, a city in the Rio de Janeiro state of Brazil – had his left side punctured by a metal spike, which then re-emerged close to his right ear (see x-ray).

The incident happened as Silva fell from a tree while picking guava fruits, landing on a rod that was jutting out of a wall below in the process. Defying all odds, the metal bar somehow missed his heart and lungs as it pierced from one side of his torso to the other.

Fire fighters arrived on the scene and took the boy, with the iron bar still protruding from both sides of his body, to a local hospital. Once in hospital Silva underwent a five-hour operation to have the spike removed by a team of doctors.

One of those doctors, Rodrigo Chicralla, told Brazil’s Globo TV it was a miracle the 10-year-old survived. The bar, which was eventually removed in one piece, only narrowly missed all arteries and vital organs, had it punctured any of these then the accident would have almost certainly proved fatal.

Dr Chicralla said: “[The bar] had passed through basic arterial route. It is difficult to arrive at a hospital with such a situation and survive… I think it was just God [that meant Silva survived the incident].”

Could there really be a link between sexuality and smoking?

A controversial study carried out by an Amsterdam-based neuroscientist claims that smoking and drinking during pregnancy could increase the chances of the baby being gay or having a low IQ.

Dr Dick Swaab, professor of neurobiology at Amsterdam University, has said that smoking, drinking, taking drugs or living in a high-pollution area during pregnancy could all have an impact on the unborn baby and its ongoing development.

Dr Swaab suggests that drinking and drug-taking could serve to lower a baby’s IQ, while taking synthetic hormones and smoking while pregnant could boost the chances of female babies becoming bisexual or gay. He asserts that living in an area that suffers from high levels of pollution while pregnant could increase the chances of the baby becoming autistic in the future.

Dr Swaab told the Sunday Times: “Pre-birth exposure to both nicotine and amphetamines increases the chance of lesbian daughters. Pregnant women suffering from stress are also more likely to have homosexual children of both genders because their raised level of the stress hormone cortisol affects the production of foetal sex hormones.

“In women who drink a lot, cells that were meant to migrate across the foetal brain can end up leaving the brain altogether,” he added.

Dr Swaab did go on to say that genetics play the major role in the development of a child, while lifestyle factors had a small influence.