GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Despite President Donald Trump's announcement Monday afternoon advising women not to take acetaminophen while pregnant, a local obstetrician gynecologist said he will continue to recommend the medication.
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said the FDA would begin notifying doctors that the use of acetaminophen "can be associated" with an increased risk of autism.
According to the CDC, 1 in 31 U.S. children are affected by autism.
Kennedy said they are launching an "all agency" effort to identify all causes of autism.
Meanwhile, experts have attributed increased rates of autism to greater awareness of the disorder and the newer, more expansive "spectrum" used to help with diagnoses of all levels.
Medical experts and public health officials have cautioned against drawing links between over-the-counter medications and autism without substantial, peer-reviewed evidence. Women are advised to talk to their doctors first.
Dr. Brad Irving, an obstetrician gynecologist with UM Health-West, said he will continue to recommend acetaminophen use for his pregnant patients.
"I hope that no patients are harmed in the process of trying to avoid Tylenol if they have high fevers, because there's really not too many other safe options that are out there that are at least effective," Irving said.
Acetaminophen, branded as Tylenol, has been the go-to pain and fever reducer for pregnant patients of Irving at UM Health-West. He said other options like aspirin and ibuprofen can cause damage to babies' developing hearts.
Irving said the latest finger pointing at acetaminophen's association with autism is nothing new and has been studied before.
"The study in question was published out of Norway, and there have been other studies that have tried to repeat that, but they haven't found the same association," Irving said.
The National Institute of Health published A Systematic Review of the Link Between Autism Spectrum Disorder and Acetaminophen in 2022.
Another study published in 2024 said "associations observed in other models may have been attributable to confounding."
Irving brings a personal perspective to the autism discussion, as one of his children is on the autism spectrum.
"One of my children is on that spectrum. I think one of the things that they don't really acknowledge is that the definition of autism spectrum has broadened significantly in the last number of years," Irving said. "So if you expand your range of your definition, you're going to have more people that fall into that net and there's a lot of factors that feed into it."
While he hasn't fielded many questions about Tylenol before now, he expects that to change, similar to what's happened with vaccines.
"I can tell you from real world examples that our level of vaccine hesitancy has gone way up compared to this year than the last or previous years," Irving said.
He said the whooping cough vaccine was accepted by close to 90% of his pregnant patients before 2020.
"We're looking at probably close to, like 60, maybe 70%. So we've had a significant drop, and we've had a lot of patients that are expressing a lot of vaccine hesitancy. A lot of it falls down on political ideology," Irving said.
Despite the president telling pregnant women, "I wanna say it like it is. Don't take Tylenol," Irving will proceed with the recommendation.
He said if patients are hesitant, they don't have to take it, but there may be risks.
"If I have someone who's got 103-104 fever, that's actually probably more dangerous than taking a Tylenol dose and ... you have to put some of those issues into perspective," Irving said. "I will probably tell patients if you have a fever, if you have aches and pains, Tylenol is an option. I'm not concerned about its safety."
Health systems, manufacturer respond
Corewell Health shared a statement with Fox 17:
Corewell Health physicians will continue to recommend Tylenol as a safe pain reliever for pregnant patients. This guidance is shared by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. All patients should consult with their health care provider before taking any medications.
Guidance from the ACOG can be seen here.
The maker of Tylenol, Kenvue, also released a statement saying:
"We believe independent, sound science clearly shows that taking acetaminophen does not cause autism. We strongly disagree with any suggestion otherwise and are deeply concerned about the health risks and confusion this poses for expecting mothers and parents."
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
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