If HB2 is not struck down, all abortion clinics would have to meet the standards of ambulatory surgical centers. Abortion providers would be required to obtain admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles. Proponents say these measures are necessary to protect Texas women. A group of physicians who have experience treating women in rural settings, for example, wrote in a brief that many parts of Texas have either no ERs or no obstetricians. Having abortion providers serve as impromptu ER doctors, if something does go awry, helps ensure continuity of care for patients.

Another brief filed by a group of pro-life doctors points to inspections of Texas abortion facilities that show poor sterilization practices, including employees who were handling bodily fluids without gloves on. A group of 3,348 women gathered together by a conservative group called The Justice Foundation all said they had been “injured by abortion”—though it’s not clear where and when all of these injuries occurred. One woman named Cindy said she had four abortions between 1978 and 1980 in West Texas. After the second one, she experienced severe bleeding but didn’t call the hospital because her abortion provider told her not to, she said. With stricter rules for abortion clinics, Texas state authorities say, there would be fewer Cindys.

During Wednesday’s oral arguments, Justice Samuel Alito said some of the Texas regulations didn’t seem that onerous. Meaning, couldn’t the clinics comply with them if they really wanted to? “I was surprised by how many are completely innocuous,” he said, singling out one rule on doorway widths.

But arguments and evidence from the other side suggest that some of the so-called TRAP laws are not so harmless. Ten other states have admitting privileges requirements, and some two dozen have the ambulatory surgical rules in place.

Already, in Texas, the number of abortion clinics in Texas has shrank from the 40 it had before the law was enacted. If the law is upheld, abortion providers say just 10 clinics would remain. They would all be located in the state’s four largest metropolitan areas, with none west of San Antonio.

Ironically, one reason abortion providers have had trouble gaining admitting privileges is that abortion is too safe. Some hospitals require doctors to admit a certain number of patients in order to get admitting privileges. The cost to upgrade to the standards of a surgical center, meanwhile, ranges from $1.7 to $2.6 million.

More women would have to drive for hours, pay for a hotel and childcare so they can wait the mandatory 24 hours, and then drive back, missing out on hundreds of dollars in wages.

In a call with reporters, Amy Hagstrom Miller, the CEO of Whole Woman’s Health, said she heard from a working mother in Lubbock who “was eight weeks in, trying to figure out how she was going to drive 350 miles multiple times and pay for the procedure and take time off work.”