Before her son was born, Danielle Alves did not know Luiz Gustavo would have microcephaly, a condition that has left the three-year-old so disabled he cannot walk, talk or eat without help. However, Alves said she would have gone ahead with the pregnancy even if she had known — and she thinks thousands of pregnant women caught up in Brazil’s Zika virus outbreak should be required to do the same.
“I know it’s very difficult to have a special needs child, but I’m absolutely against abortion,” said Alves, who lives in Vitoria da Conquista, a city in the impoverished northeastern region where Brazil’s tandem Zika and microcephaly outbreaks have been centered.
Alarm in recent months over the Zika virus, which many researchers believe can cause microcephaly in the fetuses of pregnant women, has prompted calls, both inside and outside Brazil, to loosen a near-ban on abortion in the world’s most populous Catholic country.
Photo: AP
However, the pro-choice push is creating a backlash, particularly among the families of disabled children. Many have taken to social media apps like Facebook and Whatsapp, where more than half of Brazil’s 200 million people are connected, to make their case. They argue that all babies, including those with severe forms of microcephaly, have a right to be born.
The Catholic Church and Pentecostal faiths, strong forces in this deeply religious country, have also been fighting back.
Abortion is illegal in the nation except in cases of rape, danger to the mother’s life or anencephaly, another birth defect involving the brain — although in practice wealthy women in urban areas have relatively easy access to safe abortions in private clinics, while the poor often rely on dicey back-alley procedures.
A judge in the central city of Goiania has said that he plans to authorize abortions in severe cases of microcephaly.
Some of the nation’s top newspapers have also weighed in, running editorials urging abortion laws to be revisited.
Before the outbreak, groups that support abortion groups were on the defensive following a proposal by the powerful Pentecostal lobby that would further restrict abortion access by adding additional hurdles for rape victims, such as getting an exam and filing a police report.
The proposal has been approved by a Brazilian House of Representatives committee, although its prospects in the full chamber are unclear.
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