I feel hopeful for the future of human kind

May 19, 2008
Milk of human kindness


PERSONAL CONTRIBUTION: Ms Jiang Xiaojuan is helping to nurse eight babies affected by the quake.

A CHINESE policewoman is contributing to the country's massive earthquake relief effort in a very personal way - by breast-feeding eight babies.
A newspaper in Chengdu, the capital of quake-hit Sichuan province, yesterday devoted a special page to 29-year-old Jiang Xiaojuan, calling her a 'hero' while Web users hailed her as 'the most beautiful mother' in the world.

Ms Jiang, from the quake-ravaged town of Jiangyou, has just had a child herself, the Western Daily reported. She is breast-feeding the children of three women who have been left homeless by the quake and are too traumatised to nurse, as well as five orphans, the report said.

One mother, Ms Chen Tanghua, 36, said she has been unable to breast-feed her six-month-old son. He had been crying from hunger until Ms Jiang offered to breast-feed him.

The babies who lost their parents have been put in an orphanage which does not have powdered milk, the newspaper reported. It said Ms Jiang brushed off a reporter's questions about her deed by saying: 'All mothers love children. Nursing a few babies is no big deal.'

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE