Salma Hayek Breastfeeds An African Baby

SALMA HAYEK BREASTFEEDS A STRANGER'S BABY IN AFRICA AFTER THE MOTHER RUNS OUT OF MILK by Simon Cable

The typical Hollywood superstar may be surrounded by fawning flunkeys wh

o do absolutely everything for them.

But Salma Hayek, it seems, is cast in a different mould.

Touring a hospital in war-torn Sierra Leone, the 42 year old actress came across a mother who was unable to provide milk for her malnourished one week old son.  Without hesitation, Miss Hayek took the stranger's baby and began breastfeeding it, despite the presence of several camera crews from American news network ABC, who were accompanying her on the African charity mission.  

Mexican born Miss Hayek, who at the time was breastfeeding her own one year old daughter, said, "The baby was perfectly healthy, but the mother did not have any milk.  

'He was very hungry - I was weaning my daughter Valentina, but I still had a lot of milk, so 

I breastfed the baby.

'It was amazing because he was really looking at me and he's very little.  My baby is one year so he can suck a lot harder.'

Miss Hayek, who has starred on screen alongside George Clooney and Colin Farrell

, 

was signed up as a spokesman for Unicef last year. 

Her trip was organised to help raise awareness of tetanus in Sierrra Leone, the country with  the highest rate of infant mortality in the world.

After the breastfeeding incident, she admitted she had mixed feelings. 'I thought about it,' she said.  'Am I being disloyal to my child by giving my milk away? I actually think my baby would be ery proud to be able to share her milk.

"When she grows up, I will make sure she continues to share and be a caring and generous person.'

Wetnursing or cross-feeding was common practice at the beginning before the Second World War until the introduction of artificial milk.

Miss Hayek said that she had been inspired by a story of her great grandmother.

She said, "My great grandmother was in a Mexican village and they found a 

woman in the street who was inconsolably crying and the baby was also crying.

'My great frandmother asked what the matter was and the mother said, 'She is very, very hungry and I have no more milk.'

'And in the street, my great grandmother breastfed that baby who instantly stopped crying and went peacefully to sleep.  I was really

 impressed by that story.'