Trump’s Tylenol advice: What should parents do? : Shots
The Trump administration has linked the use of acetaminophen analgesics during autism pregnancy. Here’s what science and doctors have to say about it.
Justin Sullivan / Getty images
hide
tilting legend
Justin Sullivan / Getty images
Headache? Badly behind? Bad cold? In the past, many Americans were reaching their pharmacy cupboards and would withdraw acetaminophen, known as the Tylenol brand, without any concern. It has long been an essential for home medicine, considered a sure way to treat pain and fever during pregnancy as well as in childhood, when used as indicated. But President Trump came out against this common over -the -counter medication, blaming him for the increase in cases of autism in recent years.
“Do not take tylenol if you are pregnant and you do not give your child any tylenol,” Trump said in a white house briefing, categorically repeating this warning more than a dozen times. “Fight like hell so as not to take it.”
The groups of doctors, the more Tylenol’s manufacturer, immediately pushed the president’s position, saying that he was simply not supported by research – and could have serious repercussions for women and babies.
All this means that many potential parents and parents, as well as others who sometimes take acetaminophen, suddenly wonder what they should think of this old pillar of medicine, and if they really have to be worried.
What have research studies really found?
Researchers have spent years trying to unravel all the links between autism and acetaminophen, but the evidence is uncertain, according to the new warning of the Food and Drug Administration sent to doctors. He note That, while certain studies have found an association between the use of this drug and the development of autism in children, other studies have reached the opposite conclusion.
One of the reasons why research is difficult is that parents may not remember, or can be distorted, the amount of medication they have really taken during pregnancy. This is why researchers were particularly interested in one 2019 study In the journal Jama Psychiatry, which made objective measures of drug levels in the blood of umbilical cord in nearly a thousand mother and child pairs. He found that children with the highest acetaminophen levels in their cord blood were about three times more likely to be diagnosed with autism or ADHD later, compared to children who had the lowest levels in their cord blood. However, the principal researcher took care of note that the study has not shown only the drug cause These troubles – just that there was an association.
Another influential studyOne of the largest and best controlled, was published in 2024, and he analyzed the archives of more than two million children in Sweden. He initially found a small link between the use of acetaminophen during pregnancy and autism. But the researchers knew that the genes have a powerful effect on the risk of autism, and they wanted to control this. Since the brothers and sisters share genes and also other common points such as the same family environment, they made an analysis that compared the brothers and sisters who had been exposed to acetaminophen with those who had not done so. And when they did, the link between autism and acetaminophen has disappeared.
“In other words, the association was not causal, and this was probably due to other factors such as genetics, infections, fevers, this kind of thing,” said Brian Lee of Drexel University, one of the study authors, in an interview with Allison Aubrey de NPR.
So far, he says, the evidence largely suggests that acetaminophen does not cause autism.
“I would not say that the chapter is closed on this subject, but certainly the mound of evidence of the best studies to date shows no causal effect of acetaminophen on autism.”
A researcher whose work suggested that the drug could increase the risk of autism is the epidemiologist Ann Bauer of the University of Massachusetts. She said Jon Hamilton of NPR that “the case is still open” on acetaminophen. She thinks that even if future parents should be informed of a potential risk, they should also be informed that there is real uncertainty about this risk.
She also thinks that it is tOo soon for the government to offer advice on the use of this medication and how it could be linked to autism.
“I think they can skip the weapon,” she said. “I think those of us in the research community would like to see stronger evidence.”
Why not just avoid tylenol completely during pregnancy?
President Trump has repeatedly said that there was “no drawback” so as not to take acetaminophen and that women should simply try to finish. But maternal medicine-fetal experts say that untreated fever is known to be dangerous during pregnancy, and pain is also a problem.
Society for maternal fetal medicine has noted This “untreated fever, in particular during the first trimester, increases the risk of miscarriage, congenital malformations and premature birth”.
Not treated pain can be linked to depression and high blood pressure. Nicole Baldwin, MD, a pediatrician of Cincinnati, Ohio, told Allison Aubrey de NPR that “I remember when I was pregnant with my daughter, I had a injury. I fell in the middle of a pregnancy. And if I hadn’t had Tylenol to take, I can’t imagine the suffering I had for two months.”
“There is no other medicine that these pregnant women can take,” said Baldwin because other pain and fever medications have proved dangerous during pregnancy. Ibuprofen, for example, has been linked to kidney problems in the fetus.
“Acetaminophen is one of the few options available for pregnant patients to treat pain and fever,” the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists said in a press release according to the President’s press conference. “When you consider the use of drugs during pregnancy, it is important to consider all potential risks as well as advantages.”
And this is essentially what the FDA said to doctors this week, saying that even “clinicians should consider minimizing the use of acetaminophen during pregnancy for low routine grade”, this had to be balanced with the fact that acetaminophen is the most safe option over the counter during pregnancy against fever and pain.
Who should parents trust these questions?
The worried parents could wonder how they are supposed to make decisions when the research community could debate autism and acetaminophen for the years to come.
“Who has time to sit there and go through dozens or hundreds of scientific articles on a given subject?” Sympathise Lee. “We trust our experts. And if our experts tell us one thing, but other experts say something else, it causes confusion.”
“I would say that what parents must do is take a step back and think about who they hear the messages,” said Helen Tager-Flusberg, director of the Autism Research Center of the University of Boston, said Michel Martin de NPR. “Will they listen to people who are not doctors, who have no expertise in autism, or will they turn to their medical suppliers, their treatment providers and ask them what their point of view on current science is? This is what they should do.”
Baldwin, the Cincinnati pediatrician, likes to explain that any association was seen between autism and acetaminophen in studies does not necessarily mean that there is a causal relationship. The two shark attacks and the consumption of ice cream increases in summer, she says, but that does not mean that one causes the other.
“These studies that have been released show a correlation, but do not really show causality,” said Baldwin. “” And I think it is an important thing to achieve for parents – that science is not yet known, despite what has been said. “”
