Republican senators who are also medical doctors pushed back against President Donald Trump’s insistence that pregnant women not take acetaminophen, or it will put their unborn children at risk of developing autism spectrum disorder.
Last week, the president and Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced that they had found a link between autism and the use of acetaminophen, which is the active ingredient in the widely used brand name Tylenol, and autism. The president specifically said that mothers should “Fight like hell not to take it.”
But Republican Senators who are physicians–all of whom voted to confirm Kennedy–had a more mixed response.
“I’m a doctor, and I think the best decisions were made between the doctor and his or her patients and let the healthcare providers talk to their patients,” Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), an orthopedic surgeon, told The Independent. “That’s who they ought to talk to for advice.”
Earlier this month, during a hearing of the Senate Finance Committee with Kennedy, Barrasso criticized the fact that under RFK Jr.’s watch, the United States had seen measles outbreaks, that leaders at the National Institutes of Health had questioned the use of mRNA vaccines and ripped the firing of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Chairman Susan Monarez.
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), the chairman of the Senate’s Health, Education, Labor and Pension Committee, came under sharp criticism for his crucial vote to confirm Kennedy despite the senator’s career as a gastroenterologist who specialized in treating liver disease.
Cassidy used careful language when speaking about the Trump and RFK pronouncement of a linkage between Tylenol and autism.
“I don’t want mothers to sit around and blame themselves that if they took Tylenol and they have an autistic child, that they are to blame,” he told The Independent.
“I applaud the president for raising her concern as others have not. I really applaud him for that, but I can reassure the mother that the best evidence out there, the Swedish study, shows that she is not to blame,” he said, referring to a hypothetical mother.
In 2024, a study of 2.5 million children in Sweden investigated the link between acetaminophen, autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The study found that taking acetaminophen during pregnancy was “not associated with children’s risk of autism, ADHD, or intellectual disability in sibling control analysis.”
Despite the fact that the president said that acetaminophen, also known as paracetemol, played a “ a very big factor” in children developing autism, many physicians have cautioned against Trump’s words and medical organizations pushed back.
While some research has shown that using acetaminophen during pregnancy may be linked to increased likelihood for autism and ADHD, research has not shown that its use causes the conditions.
But Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.), an obstetrician and gynecologist, referred to the White House’s official document about acetaminophen.
“The emphasis is on the long term, chronic use of it, as opposed to one-time use,” he told The Independent. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has said that acetaminophen remains one of the only safe over-the-counter drug to treat a fever during pregnancy.
When asked if he had read about autism and acetaminophen, Marshall said he had not.
“I’m starting to read more and more studies, so probably more. The last week or three, I’ve been trying to verify some of those studies they’re referencing,” he said.
But while Marshall emphasized safe use, Trump said that “you don’t take it all, but if you have to, if you can’t tough it out, if there’s a problem, you’re going to end up doing.” On Friday, he would double down on his comments.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), an ophthalmologist and libertarian, who has long been critical of public health bureaucracies, seemed more open to Trump’s skepticism.
“You know, really, in the era of modern medicine, doctors have always advised caution with the drugs that you take or the prescription drugs you take during pregnancy,” he told The Independent.
Paul referenced a study conducted with professors from Harvard University, the University of California Los Angeles, University of Massachusetts Lowell and Mount Sinai that reviewed results from 46 previous studies and found that its use during pregnancy may increase the risk of autism and ADHD.
“And I think it’s not that unreasonable, looking at the Harvard study to indicate that you assume these caution in taking Tylenol during pregnancy,” Paul said.
But the researchers recommended “judicious acetaminophen use—lowest effective dose, shortest duration—under medical guidance, tailored to individual risk-benefit assessments, rather than a broad limitation.”
Numerous health organizations, including the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists pushed back on the idea that Tylenol was unsafe.
