In the wake of the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, abortion restrictions have spread across the country with devastating consequences. Nowhere is this crisis more apparent than in Texas, where one of the nation’s most extreme abortion bans has turned pregnancy into a life-threatening condition for many.
New data from ProPublica reveals a chilling reality: since Texas’s ban went into effect, cases of sepsis—a deadly infection that can result from delayed miscarriage care—have surged by over 50% among hospitalized women who lost pregnancies in the second trimester. The state has also seen a spike in maternal deaths, a sharp rise in abandoned infants, and multiple preventable fatalities caused by hospitals refusing to provide necessary abortion care.
Following Texas’s 2021 abortion ban, dozens more pregnant and postpartum women died in Texas hospitals than compared to pre-pandemic numbers, excluding COVID-related deaths. These numbers surged in Texas despite the maternal mortality rate declining nationally. With Texas standing out as an outlier in maternal deaths, only one explanation is viable. “This is exactly what we predicted would happen and exactly what we were afraid would happen,” said Dr. Lorie Harper, a maternal-fetal medicine specialist in Austin.
Although Texas’s abortion ban includes an exception for “medical emergencies,” ongoing debates persist over what qualifies. The law imposes a cruel and unusual penalty of up to 99 years in prison for any doctor providing an abortion, leaving many women in need of care either denied or delayed treatment due to doctors fearing legal repercussions. This delay in medical intervention often results in women developing sepsis. Sepsis rates were found to be higher and more severe among women who arrived at the emergency room with a living fetus in their uterus.
The Center for Reproductive Rights has filed a lawsuit against Texas over its abortion ban. One of the original plaintiffs, Amanda Zurawski, experienced her water breaking prematurely but was unable to receive abortion care until she became septic, leading to the permanent closure of one of her fallopian tubes.
Kristen Anaya, who conceived through IVF, experienced a similar ordeal. Four months into her pregnancy, her water broke, and she began leaking amniotic fluid, essential for the fetus’s survival. At the hospital, doctors confirmed she had lost all amniotic fluid, but since the fetus still had a heartbeat, they refused to intervene. Anaya then developed an infection, experiencing uncontrollable shaking and a fever—clear signs of sepsis. Despite this, she and her husband were told there was nothing doctors could do because of Texas’s abortion laws.
Doctors forced Anaya to go through a committee to determine if her vitals met the threshold necessary to qualify for an abortion. After gaining approval, she had to wait for paperwork to process before finally being induced into labor. Although a dilation and extraction procedure would have been less strenuous on her body, she was not given that option. Instead, she was warned that going into early labor could cause further complications. A month after the procedure, Anaya was still dealing with medical complications from that traumatic experience.
ProPublica has reported two cases where women miscarried, were denied abortion care, developed sepsis, and died—two entirely preventable deaths, directly caused by Texas’s abortion law and the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.
These harsh abortion restriction have also resulted in a 500% increase in the number of abandoned infants in Texas in 2024 alone. While the state typically reports an average of seven abandoned babies per year, this figure has risen to 18. Despite the existence of Texas’ Safe Haven laws, the majority of these infants do not reach emergency services in time, as many are left in dumpsters, bushes, or clothing donation bins.
This rise in infant abandonment is linked to several factors, including restrictive abortion laws, increased deportations, and stringent immigration policies implemented both at the state level and by the Trump administration. Additionally, Texas has the highest rate of uninsured women in the country, exacerbating barriers to reproductive healthcare. Of the 18 infants abandoned in 2024, only two were safely surrendered at designated Safe Haven locations.
Supporters of Texas’s abortion ban claim it is a measure to protect life, yet its real impact has been a surge in preventable deaths, maternal suffering, and infant abandonment—clear evidence that restricting reproductive rights comes at a devastating human cost.
