But the 17-year-old is too scared to take a test to confirm if she has Zika. She admitted it would be difficult.French historian of science Ilana Löwy draws parallels with rubella in Britain and France in the 1950s, when abortion was illegal yet the number of terminated pregnancies rose dramatically.

An estimated 850,000 women in Brazil have illegal abortions every year, many under dangerous conditions. After 24 weeks, it's impossible," said Dr Elias Melo, a leading obstetrician at Hospital das Clinicas in Recife.Complicating matters, as many as 80 percent of people with Zika do not show symptoms and there is no quick and reliable test for the virus widely available.

At a hospital in Recife, Gabriela Falcao cradles her 2 month old baby who was born with microcephaly and twisted legs as she waits to see a doctor."Illegal abortions bring with them serious risks, the complications of which we have to pay careful attention to," said Jailson Correia, Recife's health secretary, calling for a national debate on liberalizing the law.Suspected cases of microcephaly have topped more than 4,000 - with more than 400 of those confirmed so far - since Zika was first detected in April."I'm too scared of finding out my baby will be sick," she told Reuters, her belly poking out from beneath a yellow top.The figures, which compare with around 150 cases across Brazil in a normal year, show no signs of slowing.Add a conservative Congress packed with Evangelical Christians staunchly opposed to easing restrictions, plus the difficulty of identifying microcephaly early enough to safely abort, and hopes for change seem likely to be frustrated."If I could go back, I still wouldn't have an abortion," she said. A 2014 election returned a Custom Solid Signs more conservative Congress, packed with Evangelicals, who account for roughly a fifth of Brazil's 200 million people."

LAWLegislative reforms seem even more unlikely.Like other women in the slums of Recife, which squat on stilts over mosquito-ridden marshland in northeast Brazil, Maria has few options if her child develops microcephaly, the condition marked by an abnormally small head and underdeveloped brain that has been linked to Zika.Yet unlike with rubella, where up to 85 percent of fetuses infected in early pregnancy develop defects, doctors so far have no proof that Zika causes microcephaly, let alone an idea of its likelihood. So she prefers not to know.

But a for-profit online service, Aborto na Nuvem, said it reported no change beyond a usual 15-20 percent monthly increase the site has registered since it launched last year.