How Anti-Abortion Laws in the Americas Are Fuelling the Zika Virus Epidemic
A combination of anti-abortion laws and inadequate access to contraception means this ‘solution’ is simply not feasible. While people inevitably continue to have sex, and anti-abortion laws persist, the Zika virus will ultimately continue to spread.
Anti-abortion laws are, unsurprisingly, ineffective. With the availability of illegal backstreet abortion clinics, we have to question whether the Zika epidemic will force more vulnerable women to risk their lives as it spreads throughout the Americas. The virus seems to cause severe birth defects, such as microcephaly, that can dramatically alter its victim’s quality of life. So given the circumstance, it is unsurprising that those women whose foetuses are affected may consider a termination.
The lack of knowledge surrounding a diagnosis like microcephaly will only makes matters worse for parents left in the dark, questioning whether their newborn child will ever be able to walk or talk.
More: How anti-abortion laws in the Americas are fuelling the Zika virus epidemic