The Lone Star State has always been a beacon for freedom-seekers. People set out to make their way in whatever way they see fit, and for a long time, the people in charge of Texas were more than happy about the state’s image.

In fact, that kind of libertarian-style thinking is what turned Texas into a Republican state to begin with. Smaller government means fewer folks telling you what to do, right?

But the days of the GOP being the party of limited government are long past now, and states that were once bastions of personal liberty are highly-regulated hotbeds of social tension when it comes to politics.

No area of Republican governance is more emblematic of this shift from guardian to Big Brother — in Texas or any other red state — than abortion policy. And while other red states may have more draconian policies than Texas, a place big enough to border four American states and four Mexican ones is going to become the biggest example of GOP policy you can find.

In 2021, Texas passed and implemented a six-week abortion ban. Now, I won’t argue against the law in this article — if you’re reading this, we likely already agree that abortion bans are an unacceptable infringement on a woman’s right to privacy. But I will say that many women don’t even know they’re pregnant at six weeks, and that essentially makes the law a total ban.

But it carried with it plenty of other right-wing nonsense: They will prosecute and imprison doctors who provide the service. They offer $10,000 rewards to citizens who report doctors performing abortions after the six-week period. It was so sweeping in its scope that even Republican Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick said as recently as last month that the language of the law should be clearer regarding exceptions for dangers to the health or life of the mother.

“I do think we need to clarify any language so that doctors are not in fear of being penalized if they think the life of the mother is at risk,” he told Dallas’ WFAA on Inside Texas Politics in January.

Maybe that’s because he heard about the astronomical rise in the rate of sepsis among pregnant women in the state.

ProPublica issued a report on Thursday that showed that sepsis, which is the body’s most extreme response to an infection, went up by 50% after the law went into effect — for women who were hospitalized after merely losing their pregnancy during the second trimester.

You read that right: Not after terminating a pregnancy, but simply suffering a miscarriage or other event that led to the loss of the pregnancy.

That’s because losing a pregnancy in the second trimester isn’t like a miscarriage shortly after finding out you’re pregnant. It’s not spotting and then confusion and loss alone in a bathroom somewhere. There’s work to be done, and the likeliest procedure a woman will undergo is an evacuation of the uterus.

In Texas, even if the fetus isn’t viable in any way, that’s now considered an abortion. It all comes down to those pesky, unclarified exceptions now.

Sepsis isn’t specific to pregnancy, of course. It’s one of the leading causes of death in any hospital, since it’s hard to gauge what a patient’s circumstances are outside of the specific emergency when they’re rushed to a hospital. But it can lead to permanent kidney failure, brain damage, blood clotting and strokes, and any number of other causes of death.

And according to the ProPublica report, “A [pregnant] patient’s risk of infection and eventual sepsis climbs with every hour after their water breaks, or their cervix opens,” so decisions need to be made immediately.

And if the nonviable fetus still had a heartbeat when a woman arrived at the hospital? Their risk of sepsis was even greater, with at least two deaths since the abortion law took effect that stemmed directly from politically-caused medical delays.

Put yourself in the hospital for a moment: You are a woman who wanted her pregnancy. You have suffered the ultimate loss and been informed that there is no chance a baby survives in your condition. Now, your very life is in the hands of politicians who still think you shouldn’t be able to get the medical procedure needed to save yourself.

Remember when I said they prosecute doctors? These are not cases where a doctor will just take a chance, perform the procedure, and then rely on the medical report to justify their actions. The consequences can be up to 99 years in prison.

There are people in Texas convicted of aggravated murder who are sentenced to less than 99 years in prison.

There are technically exceptions. But they’re so vague that mothers, doctors, insurers — everyone is scared to run afoul of the law. Which was the point, of course.

Because ANY abortions have been done under this law — never mind that they required such drastic and extenuating circumstances that they were medical and legal outliers — Governor Greg Abbott doesn’t think the law needs any clarification. “I know the law as it currently exists can work if it is properly applied,” he told the Houston Chronicle on Tuesday.

But this just proves that the abortion ban isn’t about “saving babies.” It’s about controlling women’s reproductive healthcare.