{"id":417573,"date":"2026-01-18T15:24:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-18T15:24:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/417573\/"},"modified":"2026-01-18T15:24:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-18T15:24:10","slug":"lancet-study-refutes-claim-of-a-link-between-tylenol-and-autism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/417573\/","title":{"rendered":"Lancet study refutes claim of a link between Tylenol and autism"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Allison Chang, pictured in Toronto on Friday, is part of a provincial research network investigating the biological underpinnings of neurodevelopmental disorders.Sammy Kogan\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

Allison Chang has known for about a decade that her eldest son has autism and ADHD. She is part of a provincial research network investigating the biological underpinnings of neurodevelopmental disorders. And for the past year, she has been actively researching her son\u2019s co-occuring diagnoses, pursuing a social work PhD at the University of Toronto. <\/p>\n

Ms. Chang, 53, understands the complexities of autism spectrum disorder and its underlying causes, which scientists believe to be an intricate interplay between genetics and environmental influences. But last September, she found herself anxiously interrogating decisions that she made during her pregnancy more than 15 years ago, as she watched U.S. President Donald Trump deliver a news conference linking Tylenol use in pregnancy with a \u201cvery increased risk of autism.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s that initial reaction of \u2018Oh my gosh, did I take Tylenol?\u2019\u201d she recalls. \u201cWhat did I do wrong as a parent? What did I do wrong as a mother?\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s an initial self examination. What did I do? And that leaves a lot of stressful, anxiety-related feelings.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the aftermath of Mr. Trump\u2019s comments \u2013 decried as \u201cdangerous pseudoscience\u201d by autism advocacy groups \u2013 medical bodies and experts scrambled to reassure the public<\/a> that there is no current evidence linking the popular painkiller with autism or other neurodevelopmental disorders.<\/p>\n

Medical experts fear pregnant patients will heed Trump\u2019s unproven claims about Tylenol<\/a><\/p>\n

Opinion: Why are autism rates rising? It\u2019s not Tylenol<\/a><\/p>\n

On Friday, this position was underscored by a new study<\/a> published by The Lancet Obstetrics, Gynaecology & Women\u2019s Health. The paper \u2013 which received no funding and was authored by scientists from Italy, Sweden, Norway and the United Kingdom \u2013 is a systematic review of the global body of research investigating a possible relationship between acetaminophen, the active ingredient in Tylenol, and childhood neurodevelopmental disorders.<\/p>\n

The scientific review is the second to be published by a major research journal in the wake of Mr. Trump\u2019s news conference alongside U.S. health officials such as Robert F. Kennedy Jr., where he urged pregnant women to \u201cfight like hell\u201d against taking acetaminophen \u2013 long established as the drug of choice for safely treating pain and fever in pregnancy.<\/p>\n

The earlier study, published<\/a> by the British Medical Journal in November, found insufficient evidence linking acetaminophen use in pregnancy with autism or ADHD.<\/p>\n

But the Lancet\u2019s review is even more robust, said Evdokia Anagnostou<\/a>, co-lead of the Autism Research Center at Toronto\u2019s Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital, who was not involved with the study. It includes a meta-analysis, a gold standard for high-quality information, and adjusted for genetic risk, which was not accounted for by some of the earlier reviews suggesting a link between acetaminophen and autism, she said.<\/p>\n

Once again, researchers found \u201cno evidence\u201d that acetaminophen use in pregnancy increases the risk of autism, ADHD, or intellectual disability. <\/p>\n

\u201cI could have predicted what it was going to say,\u201d said autism expert Stephen Scherer<\/a>, chief of research at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, who has done seminal research on the genetics of autism<\/a>. \u201cIts findings are consistent with what we already knew \u2013 which is inconsistent with what RFK Jr. and President Trump told us from the White House.\u201d<\/p>\n

So while our scientific understanding of Tylenol\u2019s safety profile in pregnancy remains unchanged, Mr. Trump\u2019s controversial declarations in September continue to have damaging ripple effects.<\/p>\n

Some worry that pregnant women could be avoiding acetaminophen for treating pain or fever, which could carry consequences for both the mother and baby. At St. Michael\u2019s Hospital in Toronto, Tali Bogler<\/a>, chair of family medicine obstetrics, says she\u2019s noticed \u201ca very clear increase in concern and hesitancy\u201d around taking acetaminophen in pregnancy and \u201cmuch more avoidance overall.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Eda Karacabeyli<\/a>, clinical assistant professor and division head of maternal fetal medicine at the University of British Columbia, she hasn\u2019t seen patients spurning the painkiller. But she and her colleagues have noticed pregnant people asking more questions about drug safety, not just for Tylenol but all medications. <\/p>\n

Long-time autism researchers such as Dr. Scherer worry about the opportunity cost of this outsized attention on Tylenol. He pointed out that in the aftermath of the retracted and widely-debunked Andrew Wakefield paper in 1998 \u2013 which fraudulently claimed a link between the MMR vaccine and autism \u2013 there was a North America-wide research effort to investigate the questions it raised.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the study sites was here at SickKids and it essentially delayed all other research for the better part of a year,\u201d he said. \u201cAny time you have to go back and do another study over and over and over again, it takes time, and it takes away from other things that you\u2019re doing.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Canada, researchers are now having \u201cdifficult conversations\u201d about how to address the fears being stoked by the Trump administration, according to Dr. Anagnostou.<\/p>\n

Her research priorities have always been set in partnership with autistic people and their families. \u201cWe want to give people the answers they need,\u201d she said. \u201c[But] anxieties have changed \u2026 This is not what they prioritized before this announcement, as the most important thing to spend money on.\u201d<\/p>\n

After Mr. Trump\u2019s news conference, Dr. Anagnostou saw a \u201cpeak of distressed families,\u201d especially mothers who filled her inbox every day with anxious e-mails, revisiting their medical records and questioning their past decisions.<\/p>\n

\u201cI personally believe this was a harmful public announcement,\u201d she said. \u201cA whole lot of scientific knowledge and expertise was ignored.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Allison Chang, pictured in Toronto on Friday, is part of a provincial research…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":417574,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,49,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,84,889,890,884,904,377,885,909,910,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,865,61,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-417573","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-medication","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-health","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-medication","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417573","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=417573"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/417573\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/417574"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=417573"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=417573"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=417573"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}