Local Providers Respond to Trump Administration’s Tylenol Claims
As the U.S. Food and Drug Administration maintains its recommendations, local doctors point to the proven benefits of Tylenol as the sole pain reliever pregnant patients can use
By Zoë Buhrmaster
The Trump Administration’s announcement last week warning pregnant parents to avoid Tylenol for fear it causes autism has forced Flathead Valley medical professionals to confront long-disputed links between the drug and the developmental disorder, citing unproven studies and raising concern over the announcement’s inflammatory tone, which they say could cause harm by misinforming families and pregnant individuals.
“One of the main flaws is they’re not looking at all the potential factors that could be related to the development of autism,” Molly Nicolson, a recent doctoral graduate with Kalispell Midwives and Women’s Health about the studies, said. “Some [studies] haven’t looked at familial links or genetics. It’s so complex, there’s too many causes to say that when there’s just not enough evidence.”
On Sept. 22, President Donald Trump made headlines in the health world when he declared that Tylenol, also known by its generic name acetaminophen, “can be associated with a very increased risk of autism.”
“It’s not good,” Trump warned.
Later that day, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) posted a softer-toned announcement that the governmental agency was initiating a process to alter the over-the-counter drug’s labels to reflect studies that suggested acetaminophen “may be associated with an increased risk of neurological conditions such as autism and ADHD in children.”
Medical organizations including the American College of Obstetricians & Gynecologists (ACOG) and the American College of Nurse-Midwives have both released statements since the federal announcement confirming the safety of using acetaminophen. Both groups pointed out that the research does not support a “causal link,” or any proof that Tylenol is the factor that can cause autism.
The ACOG notes that other flaws with the referenced studies include self-reporting, lack of detailed data, neglect of postnatal acetaminophen exposure, and other deviances from scientific study standards.
Dr. Samantha Greenberg leads the obstetrics program and the Family Medicine Residency for Greater Valley Health Center. She’s taken a proactive approach with patients to discuss the administration’s take on Tylenol, including explaining what the evidence does and doesn’t show.
“We always as medical professionals have to not just take things at face value,” Greenberg said. “We have to wade into why these are the recommendations … when politics and medicine end up intersecting it’s important to look at. The internet allows anyone to look at studies. But you have to look at the whole picture of what a study is showing.”
The intertwining of politics and medicine has become more difficult to untangle in recent years, according to Dr. Todd Bergland, a direct primary care provider at Fountainhead DPC. The Trump Administration’s recent claims about Tylenol carry a tone of certainty in them that medical professionals often hesitate to employ, due in large part to the inherent uncertainty of medical research, Bergland said.
“I think it’s important in medicine and in science to know that things do change,” Bergland said, explaining that medicine or treatment deemed safe and useful may later be determined to have problems.
“But I don’t believe that the good quality information we have on Tylenol and autism would support a link there,” Bergland said.
Dr. Dan Gragert, a direct primary care physician at Bluebird Health, said that the announcement comes as an easy target.
“Most clinicians recognize this as a politically expedient target that generates media attention while drawing minimal industry pushback,” Gragert said in an email to the Beacon. “Acetaminophen represents perhaps the safest choice the government could scrutinize publicly without facing significant opposition.”
Nicolson, along with the other Flathead County providers, said that their advice to patients hasn’t changed.
The most dangerous potential downstream effects the administration’s public health announcement is not that fewer people will take less Tylenol, said Greenberg. The FDA’s recommendation for use remains the same – to take the lowest amount of Tylenol over the least amount of time, ideally in concert with advice from a personal provider. Instead, Greenberg is concerned about the message the announcement sends to pregnant women.
“It devalues women and their bodies and their pain and their role in our society and minimizes them to a vessel that is carrying a pregnancy,” Greenberg said. “Pregnancy is the most dangerous state a woman can be in her life. There are legitimate reasons for taking pain medicine.”
Acetaminophen is also the only pain reliever and fever reducer that is safe to use during pregnancy, as aspirin and ibuprofen both have serious, well-documented risks. For pregnant parents, having access to a method of pain relief in times of need is critical.
“If we don’t have that it can be dangerous in other ways,” Nicolson said. “There’s known risks to an untreated fever and long-term pain in pregnancy.”
Poor mental health during pregnancy, including anxiety or depression, pose serious risks that are also well documented. Some of those risks include pre-term birth, low birth weight, along with difficulties with bonding and achieving health-related milestones after birth.
“Saying that the medicine we consider most safe is unsafe basically tells women you need to just suffer and that their pain and their discomfort are not enough. I think that is harmful,” Greenberg said. “I think every pregnant person already has guilt about what they are and aren’t doing – to add onto that feels wrong.”