the Paraná Research Institute in the same year also concluded that 86.5% of Brazilians were against the decriminalization. According to the Ibope (largest research institute in Brazil), in 2018, eight out of ten Brazilians oppose legalization. In a survey conducted in 2018, by the Datafolha Institute, 41% of Brazilians declared themselves in favor of a complete ban on abortion, 34% said they wanted to keep the legislation as it is, 16% said that they wanted to expand it to more situations and only 6% said they were in favor of legalizing abortion under any circumstances. The anti-abortion view is also followed by the majority of federal deputies, which makes it virtually impossible to attempt to legalize abortion through the Legislative Branch. All of this has led the small group of abortion supporters to appeal to the Supreme Court, claiming that criminalization of abortion, "violates fundamental human precepts". In 2021, a survey conducted by PoderData found that 58% of Brazilians are against the legalization of abortion in Brazil; those who are favorable of legalization add up to 31%. Another 11% did not know or did not respond. Another survey conducted in 2021 by Paraná Pesquisas, however, found that 79% of Brazilians remain against the legalization of abortion, and only 16.6% are favorable to it. In all the surveys carried out, in general, Brazilians are considered one of the peoples least in favor of legalizing abortion. Currently, Brazil is the biggest country in the world to ban abortion in the name of the recognition of the rights of the unborn. Excommunication controversy In March 2009, after an abortion on a nine-year-old girl raped by her stepfather and pregnant with twins had been performed because of the rape exception clause in Brazil’s Penal Code, Archbishop José Cardoso Sobrinho of Olinda and Recife stated that automatic excommunication had been incurred by the girl's mother and the medical team. President Lula da Silva and Health Minister José Gomes Temporão decried his statement, and the National Conference of Bishops of Brazil disowned it, saying that the mother was certainly not excommunicated and there was insufficient evidence to show that any member of the medical team was. The statement was criticized also on the Vatican newspaper by the President of the Pontifical Academy for Life. One of the doctors concerned said the controversy had drawn needed attention to Brazil's restrictive abortion laws. Anencephaly exception In July 2004,