Experts Push Back as Trump Administration Links Autism to Tylenol

Scientific experts across the world have rejected Donald Trump’s recent warning that pregnant women should avoid taking Tylenol, the over-the-counter painkiller.

In a press briefing on September 22, the US president made the claim that the drug – which is sold under the name paracetamol in other parts of the world – increases the risk of an unborn baby developing autism.

In conjunction with the conference, the US National Institutes of Health announced it has launched an Autism Data Science Initiative, which will “harness large-scale data resources to explore contributors to the causes and rising prevalence of autism spectrum disorder.”

Experts react to autism claim

Speaking in the White House on Monday, the US president claimed that “the meteoric rise in autism is among the most alarming public health developments in history – there’s never been anything like this.”

He went on to announce that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will begin notifying doctors that acetaminophen – the analgesic agent of paracetamol/Tylenol – can increase the risk of autism in pregnancy. A warning label will also be required to be placed on the drug’s packaging, citing a “possible association” between autism in children.

“Effective immediately, the FDA will be notifying physicians at the use of […] acetaminophen, which is commonly known as Tylenol,” the president said. “During pregnancy, [it] can be associated with a very increase [sic] risk of autism. So taking Tylenol is not good. I’ll say it; it’s not good.”

Autism and maternal health experts around the world have been quick to counter the advice from the president and the preexisting research that has linked to acetaminophen to autism cases.

“I have assessed the risks to health from numerous medications over the past 15 years and I am confident that the best available evidence shows us paracetamol is safe to take during pregnancy within the recommended limits and does not increase the risk of children being born with autism,” Dr. Laurie Tomlinson, a research professor at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, told the UK Science Media Centre in a statement.

“These claims seem to ignore numerous factors, including why paracetamol was taken in the first place,” Tomilson continued. “For example, women with hypermobility are more likely to have autistic children (since the two conditions are linked) and so may have needed to take paracetamol for joint pain during pregnancy, but it is the shared genetic causes rather than the drug that means that the child is more likely to be autistic.”

“Alongside my research experience,” Tomilson added, “I am also the mother of two autistic children and I know that this announcement will cause distress and guilt to many parents, who often ask themselves whether they are to blame. I urge those parents to focus on the countless number of reputable sources of evidence published to date that do not show a link between paracetamol and autism, and to seek medical advice from their own GP or health practitioner. I urge you to not get caught up in a political misinformation agenda that is trying to hunt for an ‘easy’ answer as to how autism develops, and does not serve to help our children.”

Since President Trump’s announcement, representatives from international health agencies, such as the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and the World Health Organization, have also reiterated that paracetamol/Tylenol is safe for use during pregnancy.

“Paracetamol remains an important option to treat pain or fever in pregnant women,” Dr. Steffen Thirstrup, the EMA’s chief medical officer, said in a statement. “Our advice is based on a rigorous assessment of the available scientific data and we have found no evidence that taking paracetamol during pregnancy causes autism in children.”

Tylenol and autism

One of the most thorough studies assessing whether taking acetaminophen during pregnancy is linked to autism was published in JAMA last year.

The study analyzed health data on nearly 2.5 million children born in Sweden between 1995 and 2019 and data on acetaminophen prescriptions during pregnancy and on self-reported use collected by midwives, as well as whether children later received autism diagnoses.

The study did show that around 1.42% of children exposed to acetaminophen during pregnancy were autistic, compared to 1.33% of children who were not exposed ─ a difference acknowledged as “very small” by the authors.

The researchers thus concluded that the drug’s use during pregnancy was not associated with children’s risk of autism, ADHD or intellectual disability.

The “very small” difference they observed between the autistic and non-autistic children may, they said, have been attributable to confounding, unknown factors.

“There are many studies which refute a link, but the most important was a Swedish study of 2.4 million births (1995–2019) published in 2024 which used actual sibling data and found no relationship between exposure to paracetamol in utero and subsequent autism, ADHD or intellectual disability,” Dr. Monique Botha, an associate professor in social and developmental psychology at Durham University – who was not involved in the JAMA research – said in a recent statement to the UK Science Media Centre.

“This suggests no causal effect of paracetamol in autism,” Botha continued. “This is further strengthened by there being an absence of a dose dependent relationship. There is no robust evidence or convincing studies to suggest there is any causal relationship and any conclusions being drawn to the contrary are often motivated, under-evidenced and unsupported by the most robust methods to answering this question. I am exceptionally confident in saying that no relationship exists.”