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The state of Texas recently passed a bill that’s got everyone with a clue worried, to say the least: S.B. 8 bans abortions after six weeks. The law is up for consideration by the Supreme Court but until SCOTUS makes a decision — which they are expected to do this year — the ban is being upheld. This has put a major strain on Texas abortion providers and, well, anyone who believes in choice. Not only that, but medical experts say that the so-called “heartbeat” laws are based on a flawed premise.

Supposedly, the reasoning behind the anti-abortion crusade’s six-week mark is that by that time, ultrasound machines are able to detect a fetal heartbeat and therefore a live birth is possible. This premise, however, isn’t scientifically sound. Fetuses don’t actually have the organized muscle tissue that it takes to make a heart until about the 20th week of pregnancy, MedicineNet reported. Not only that, but most global medical experts agree that a baby does not have a viable chance of survival until the 24th week, according to the U.K.’s National Health Service.

What, then, is the heartbeat sound that ultrasounds find at six weeks? It’s the electrical pulsing of a tube of cardiac cells. “What you see and hear on an early ultrasound is embryonic activity — electrical currents being sent through cells that will develop at a much later time into a heart,” Gabriela Aguilar, an NYC-based obstetrician-gynecologist, told the New York Times. So sure, that tube of cells is a primitive version of what will eventually become the heart, but to call it a heart is kind of like calling an acorn an oak tree.

Some anti-abortion doctors also think that the electric pulse detected by ultrasound “counts” as a heartbeat. “It is a heart tube, but it is still a heart. The shape is different, but that doesn’t change the essence of what it is,” Christina Francis, chair of the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists, told the Times. I am unconvinced by the argument that because a set of cells could potentially become an organ that they should be considered that organ, but you can decide for yourself.

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This summer, the Supreme Court is expected to issue a ruling on a case involving a Mississippi law banning abortions at 15 weeks. The court’s decision could potentially overturn or greatly weaken Roe v. Wade, which enshrines a person’s right to an abortion under the Constitution. Rather than waiting for that potential implosion, Vermont has taken matters into its own hands, moving one step closer this week to passing its own abortion rights legislation.

The Personal Reproductive Liberty Amendment, or Proposition 5, would make Vermont the first state to explicitly protect reproductive rights within its own constitution. Per local outlet NBC5, the legislation states:

An individual’s right to personal reproductive autonomy is central to the liberty and dignity to determine one’s own life course, and shall not be denied or infringed unless justified by a compelling state interest achieved by the least restrictive means.

The resolution was first passed by the state Senate in spring 2019. Then it made its way to the state House this year — where, on Tuesday, it passed with a 107-41 vote.

Democratic legislators have stressed the importance of Proposition 5 as federal abortion protections become increasingly tenuous. The Portland Press Herald reported that Democratic state Rep. Ann Pugh said, “While the right to reproductive autonomy, and abortion care, remains for the time being a fundamental right at the national level, it has been and continues to be under serious attack. In this turbulent time clarity is called for.”

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With the future of Roe in the hands of a conservative Supreme Court, Vermont legislators have moved to enshrine abortion access into the state constitution.

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