Pope suggests contraception can be condoned in Zika crisis

An outbreak of the Zika virus sweeping across Latin America and the Caribbean could make use of contraceptives a "lesser evil" for Catholics prohibited by the church from using birth control, Pope Francis said.

Health officials link the virus to birth defects. The Roman Catholic Church considers abortion or the use of contraceptives a sin.

The Catholic News Service says the pope, during a news conference aboard his flight from Mexico to Rome late Wednesday, emphasized the difference between the sins.

"Abortion is not a lesser evil — it's a crime ... an absolute evil," Pope Francis said. "Don't confuse avoiding pregnancy with abortion."

Francis cited Paul VI's consent in the early 1960s for women in the then-Belgian Congo to use oral contraceptives when rape was being used as a weapon of war, CNS said. "Avoiding pregnancy is not an absolute evil," the pontiff said.

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The pope faced similar questions about contraception during a trip to Africa, where sexually transmitted AIDS remains a major concern. Francis deflected the questioning, listing hunger, lack of drinking water and exploitation among more pressing issues for the continent.

After a visit to Asia in January 2015, the pope said Catholics may have a moral responsibility to limit the number of their children and need not reproduce "like rabbits.'' But he reaffirmed the church's ban on artificial means of birth control and said Catholics should practice "responsible parenting."

The World Health Organization recently declared the Zika epidemic a "public health emergency of international concern." The agency this week asked nations around the world for $56 million to fight Zika through the end of June.

The concern is based partly on the link between Zika and an increase in birth defects in Brazil. Trash-strewn streets in impoverished urban slums provide ideal breeding grounds for the Aedes aegypti mosquitoes that spread Zika.

Zika is linked to microcephaly, a neonatal malformation in which babies are born with abnormally small heads and incomplete brain development. "Although not proven, researchers are studying a potential link between this surge in microcephaly cases and Zika virus infection," WHO says.

Thomas Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, says the evidence linking the birth defect to the virus is growing stronger.

Scientists found genetic material from Zika in the brains of dead babies and fetuses with microcephaly. Officials in some nations are urging women to postpone getting pregnant until the outbreak eases.

Francis urged researchers "to do their utmost to find vaccines against these mosquitoes that carry this disease," CNS reported.

In Juarez, across the border from El Paso, residents reflected on the pope's visit and the Zika outbreak.

Denise Cordova, 23, rested her hand on her pregnant belly as she relaxed on cobblestone bench in the city’s downtown plaza.

With a little girl due in a month, she said she was worried about her baby amid the Zika outbreak. “Everybody else is probably worried about their babies, too,” she said.

“I’m scared, and I hope everything will be OK,” she said. “These children are our future.”

Casilda Vergara, 29, a Veracruz native who has lived in Juarez for the past 10 years, said an exception to the church’s stance on contraception would be a good thing.

“I think that (decisions about contraceptive methods) are up to each person,” Vergara, who has a 13-year-old, said. “Some might disagree, but it is up to each person.”

Delilah Gonzalez, 38, who is Christian but not Catholic, said she was “concerned about contracting the disease, but (contraception) is my decision as a female.”

“I don’t need his (the pope’s) permission, because it’s my body,” she said.

Sarai Ramirez, 20, saw the pope’s comments as a recommendation, not a mandate.

As she and two friends handed out fliers to passersby on a sunny corner of the plaza, she said she’d never used contraceptive pills and didn’t plan to change her mind now.

“It’s not really a religious topic for me,” she said, though she said she did think the pope’s advice was “valid on a common-sense level.”

“If (contraception) will help women avoid those scary birth defects in areas where the virus is really prevalent right now, then that’s a good thing,” she said.

Contributing: Liz Szabo; Maria Polletta, Dianna M. Náñez, Rafael Carranza reporting from Juarez, Mexico