The government of El Salvador has taken the amazing step of advising women not to become pregnant in the next two years. This advice is because of the spread of the Zika virus, which can cause devastating birth defects if a pregnant woman becomes infected.
At least six other countries are making similar recommendations or warnings in Central and South America and the Caribbean. These warnings are raising anxiety for millions of women who are pregnant or who might become pregnant. For many who are already pregnant, reports about Zika have made them fearful at a time they should be happy.
World Health Organization officials called the spread of the virus is "explosive" and said that there could be up to 4 million cases of Zika in the next year.
Zika is spread by mosquito bites and has been linked to a type of birth defect called microcephaly, where the skull and brain are small and underdeveloped. Microcephaly causes serious developmental delays and shortens life expectancy. At one time, people with microcephaly were exhibited in side shows as "pinheads." As yet, only Brazil has seen a large increase in the number of cases of babies with microcephaly. WHO officials say it may take several months before a link between Zika and microcephaly can be proven or disproven.
Adding to the worries of many women are social and religious concerns in Latin America. Abortion is strictly limited or outlawed altogether in many countries in Central and South America. At least 4.4 million pregnancies were aborted in 2008 in Latin America; with almost all of them being performed in illegal or unsafe conditions, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a U.S. organization that promotes reproductive health rights.
In some areas of Latin America, access to birth control is expensive or difficult. For example, half of all pregnancies in El Salvador are unplanned.
Symptoms of Zika include a mild fever and a rash, but up to 80% of those infected show no symptoms at all. The type of mosquito that transmits Zika, the Aedes species, is present in much of the Americas.
