When Savita Halappanavar, an Indian woman living in Ireland, died last year after being denied a potentially life saving termination, the country's highly restrictive abortion laws came under international scrutiny. Ireland has a constitutional ban on abortion that makes it next to impossible for doctors to carry out terminations even in cases where a woman's life is in imminent danger.

The embarrassment caused by Halappanavar's death finally prompted the Irish government to rethink its "no way never" stance on abortion, and it is in the process of pushing through a law that would allow terminations in some (very limited) circumstances. Ironically though, just as Ireland has begun the slow process of digging its way out of the black hole where women's reproductive and human rights have long been buried, states across America are revving up the bulldozers to dig their own.

This week in Texas, a second special session is in progress in which it is all but certain that a highly restrictive abortion bill, now known as SB1, will finally be passed. It took a dramatic 11-hour long filibuster by Democratic state senator Wendy Davis, helped along by an "unruly mob" of pro-choice demonstrators who using what Lt Governor David Dewhurst described as "occupy Wall Street tactics", to block a previous version of the bill.

Protestors continue to swarm the Texas capitol building as the second special session continues, but there are more than enough votes in the Republican-controlled legislature to pass the bill and Governor Rick Perry has already made it clear that when SB1 reaches his desk, he will waste no time in signing it into law.

If this happens, it will mean that no abortions may be performed in the state of Texas after the 20th week of pregnancy. Doctors who perform abortions will have to have hospital admitting privileges within 30 miles of their clinic (most do not). Women who opt to take the abortion inducing drugs will have to do so in the presence of a doctor instead of at home. Finally, all but 5 of the 42 abortion facilities currently operating in Texas will be forced to close as they will be unable to meet the new requirements to upgrade to Ambulatory Surgical Center standards.

Cumulatively, these restrictions mean that many if not most women living in Texas will be simply unable to obtain an abortion in their state and opponents rightfully fear that a backstreet abortion industry will inevitably rise up instead. To emphasize this point, Texas democrats showed up at the senate hearing on Tuesday carrying wire hangers.

Extreme as the new restrictions on abortion that are likely to become law in Texas are, however, they are not unusual in present day America – or at least in the parts of America where conservative Republicans are calling the shots. So far 12 states with GOP-controlled legislatures have passed laws banning abortions after 20 weeks. Arizona won't allow abortions after 18 weeks and North Dakota leads the pack with a ban on abortion after six weeks.

Already this summer, Ohio and North Carolina have both snuck through abortion restrictions similar to the ones about to be imposed in Texas. Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin also signed a new abortion bill into law that requires women to get an ultrasound before obtaining the procedure and bans doctors who lack admitting privileges at nearby hospitals from performing abortions. A judge has temporarily blocked elements of that law, and other state laws are also likely to face legal challenges but the trajectory is clear – women's reproductive rights in many parts of America are being steadily eroded.

No doubt anti-choicers are already celebrating these various "victories". If the Texas legislature does pass SB1 this week, as expected, they will be breaking out the champagne even as they plan the next step on the road to making abortion illegal altogether in America.

Much as I hate to rain on anybody's parade, I feel compelled to point out that eliminating safe and legal abortions will neither eliminate the need for the procedure nor stop women from obtaining abortions that are not necessarily safe at all. What will happen is that more women will endure trauma and hardship as they try to cope with unwanted pregnancies or complications arising from pregnancies.

Ireland is a good example of what happens when abortions are unavailable. The country has a constitutional ban on abortion, but that does not mean that women in Ireland do not have or need them. Every day approximately 12 Irish women make the lonely journey to the UK to obtain an abortion. Many of them are carrying fetuses with fatal abnormalities, many of them have been warned by their doctors that their health or even their lives will be at risk if they carry their babies to term, many are pregnant as a result of rape or incest, many are suicidal.

Some women can't face the lonely journey or simply can't afford to make it so they order medications online to induce an abortion and then avoid checking into hospital when the procedure goes wrong because they fear criminal charges. Some women, like Savita Halavappaner, don't have the luxury of time to book a flight to a foreign country when they find themselves in need of an emergency termination and so they die.

Such is the reality of life for women in the abortion-free Utopia that is Ireland. Women in Texas will soon be facing a similar reality if SB1 becomes law. Speaking recently on Al Jazeera, reproductive rights activist Andrea Grimes predicted that women in the state, especially women in rural areas who will be hundreds of miles from any clinic will have little choice but to cross the border into Mexico to obtain an abortion or avail of "Doctor Google's" free advice to induce their own.

There is nothing positive to say about the Texas law or any of the similar laws that have been rammed through in other states except that at least the public appears to have woken up to the dangerous attacks on women's reproductive rights. Hopefully it won't take an American Savita for conservative legislators with political agendas that have little to do with women's health, to wake up as well.