A woman who died in a Texas hospital after a miscarriage is named Josseli Barnica.

She's the latest woman whose deadly experience with restrictive abortion laws makes headlines – here's what we know about who she was and what happened to her.

After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade In 2022, each state was given the power to set its own abortion laws, some more restrictive than others. Since then, several stories have emerged about how these laws have affected the health care of pregnant women.

In September of this year, Amber Thurman, a Georgia woman who died after failing to receive timely medical care, was named by a nonprofit investigative journalism website as the first “preventable” abortion fatality since those various states implemented bans ProPublica reported at the time.

Now, ProPublicareviewed a summary of Barnica's medical records and revealed the story of the 28-year-old mother who died in 2021 after suffering a miscarriage at 17 weeks' gestation at HCA Houston Healthcare Northwest.

While 2021 was before the overthrow of Roe v. Wadeit was after Texas passed SB 8, which bans abortions after the sixth week of pregnancy.

Barnica should have been offered a procedure to speed up delivery or empty her uterus, said several medical experts, including gynecologist Dr. Leilah Zahedi-Spung ProPublica.

HCA Healthcare, the hospital chain that operates HCA Houston Healthcare Northwest, told the outlet that doctors exercised independent judgment.

“Our responsibility is to comply with applicable state and federal laws and regulations,” it said. Newsweek has contacted HCA Healthcare via email for further comment.

What happened to Josseli Barnica?

On September 3, 2021, Barnica's miscarriage was “in progress,” with the fetus pressed against her cervix, exposing it to bacteria, according to hospital records cited by ProPublica.

However, she reportedly remained without intervention for 40 hours because doctors “had to wait until her heart stopped beating” and “it would be a crime to give her an abortion,” Barnica's husband said after rushing to her side.

Barnica died of an infection three days after her delivery. The cause of death was given as “sepsis due to acute bacterial endometritis and cervicitis following spontaneous abortion of a 17-week-old stillborn fetus (177 grams) with retained products of conception.”

“Retention products of conception” are tissue that grew during Barnica’s pregnancy and remained after her miscarriage.

Who is Josseli Barnica?

Barnica, who met her husband at a local soccer match in 2019, was a mother who wanted to give her daughter a sibling. ProPublica reported.

She was an immigrant from Honduras who lived in Houston and installed drywall to make money. Some of it went home to support her mother.

After Barnica's daughter was born in 2020, she wrote on social media: “God bless my family. Our first Christmas with our princess. I love her.”

How did America react to the death of Josseli Barnica?

As with several other cases in which pregnant women died in states with restrictive abortion laws, news of Barnica sparked outrage.

The National Abortion Federation quickly issued a statement comparing Barnica's story to that of other women who had suffered what the organization called “entirely preventable deaths.”

“Josseli Barnica should be alive today,” it said, adding: “Abortion restrictions and bans do not end the need for this vital health care; they simply make access more difficult by forcing patients and providers into impossible situations.”

“No one should fear seeking medical care, and no healthcare provider should fear being prosecuted for providing the best standard of care.”

LiveAction, a global anti-abortion organization founded by pro-life activist Lila Rose, did not specifically mention the Barnica case.

But on Tuesday it published one of the positions it had previously held: “Abortion is never medically necessary. Emergency cesarean sections or premature births are standard treatments for medical emergencies. The additional steps of injecting a child with feticide to stop its heartbeat or tearing limbs from its body are not necessary for the care of the mother.”

Newsweek has reached out to National Right to Life, America's oldest and largest grassroots pro-life organization, for comment.

Abortion more important to voters than immigration

Abortion has long been an important issue in this election. The Democrats present themselves as the party of reproductive freedom and warn that Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump wants to introduce a nationwide ban on abortion, something he has repeatedly denied.

Last week, abortion overtook immigration to become the second most important issue for voters, according to a poll commissioned by Redfield & Wilton Strategies Newsweek.

Over a 16-month period, the company surveyed 34,800 voters: “What issues are most likely to determine how you vote in the November 2024 presidential election?” You can choose up to three.”

Only four of the 24 topics were repeatedly selected by more than two in five respondents: the economy, abortion, immigration and health care.

In all surveys conducted between July 2023 and October this year, the economy was cited as voters' most important election issue and was regularly cited by around 60 percent of respondents.

Both abortion and immigration competed for second place throughout the poll, but abortion was the issue that rose to the forefront, overtaking immigration in recent months.

Abortion was mentioned as a central issue by 21 percent of respondents in the first survey from July 2023, and by 38 percent of respondents in the last survey from October 2024.

In contrast, immigration was cited as a key issue by 30 percent of respondents in the first survey in July 2023, and by 36 percent of respondents in the most recent survey in October 2024.