Austin, Texas - The Texas state legislature has passed a bill that would allow private citizens to sue anyone who manufactures, distributes, or provides abortion pills – inside or outside the state.

The Texas state Senate on Wednesday evening voted 17-8 in favor of House Bill 7 – the so-called "Woman and Child Protection Act" – which already passed out of the House last week.

Republican Governor Greg Abbott is expected to sign the bill into law.

According to the legislation, private citizens would receive up to $100,000 in cases of successful lawsuits. If the plaintiff is not directly related to the fetus, they would only be allowed to keep 10% of the damages, while the rest would go to a charity of their choice.

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People who take abortion medication cannot be sued under the bill.

Republican Senator Bryan Hughes claimed on the Senate floor that the legislation is necessary because "we care about that little baby growing inside her mother’s womb."

Opponents have pointed out that the bill would foster a bounty-hunting culture that endangers access to medical care.

"H.B. 7 exports Texas' extreme abortion ban far beyond state borders. It will fuel fear among manufacturers and providers nationwide, while encouraging neighbors to police one another's reproductive lives, further isolating pregnant Texans, and punishing the people who care for them," Blair Wallace, policy and advocacy strategist on reproductive freedom at the ACLU of Texas, said in a statement.

"We believe in a Texas where people have the freedom to make decisions about our own bodies and futures."

Senator Molly Cook, a Houston Democrat and registered nurse, described the bill as part of Texas' "systematic, abusive isolation of women" which will only "exacerbate the fragmented, hostile healthcare landscape."