By expressing breast milk, Jillian Fleming - who has an eight-month-old daughter - is helping to secure healthy lives for babies whose mothers are too sick to feed them.
Jillian Fleming is definitely not your average first-time mother. Not only does this remarkable young woman breastfeed her own daughter, but she also expresses breast milk that is helping secure healthy lives for at least three other babies too.
Fleming is helping fill a huge gap which Professor Gert Kirsten, head of the neo-natal intensive care unit at Tygerberg Hospital, describes as just as desperate as the constant calls for blood donation.
"With the spiralling rate of HIV and Aids, we are seeing more and more sick mothers who are not able to express breast milk to feed their newborns," he said.
And the difference between feeding a newborn on breast milk and baby formula is vital; while formula has a nutritional role, unlike breast milk it has none of the antibodies and lymphocytes which inhibit the growth of bacteria in the baby's gut.
For premature babies the need for donor breast milk becomes all-important, contributing directly to saving the babies' lives, Kirsten said. "Premature babies especially have very little natural immunity and their resistance to infection is very limited.
"If they don't get breast milk they suffer a condition called necrotising enterocolitis which is effectively infection of the gut, which can be fatal," he said.
Fleming, 33, of Mowbray, heard about the Western Cape Human Milk Bank at her baby clinic, was immediately interested and started expressing milk and freezing it once her own baby was satisfied.
Although she said she struggled with breastfeeding initially, she is proud of her perseverance and intends feeding little Ayla for as long as possible.
Kirsten said Fleming's extra breast milk was being fed to a pair of twins whose mother was too ill to express milk and another premature baby awaiting adoption.
They had started formula feeding the twins because their mother had lupus and was on strong medication which could be transmitted via breast milk, so endangering the children. "They nearly died of necrotising enterocolitis but once they'd recovered we started them on donor breast milk and both are doing wonderfully."
Jacquie Nutt, spokeswoman for the Western Cape Human Milk Bank, said there was always a need for donors because mothers did not always breastfeed for long periods and so donated milk for limited time periods. They were also constantly looking for volunteers to collect and deliver the donor milk.
"We started about two years ago with the aim of providing breast milk for Aids orphans but the hospitals slowly came on board and we've found people to be extremely generous about helping," she said.
Kirsten explained that the donor milk was always completely safe, thanks to the so-called "Pretoria pasteurisation method", initiated at the University of Pretoria.
"It's a very simple method that involves bringing water to the boil, taking it off the stove and then submerging the breast milk container in the water for 25 minutes.
"All the donor milk is pasteurised this way, which guarantees it is safe, even in cases where mothers are HIV-positive," he said.
For Fleming it is a labour of love. "I'll do this for as long as I can," she said simply.
- For information call Jacquie Nutt on 021 873 0004.