There’s some confusion and pushback in Colorado after President Trump urged pregnant mothers not to take acetaminophen, the active ingredient in Tylenol, suggesting a possible association between the medication and autism.
The Trump Administration did not present any new evidence to back up the claim, but it did lay out what it’s calling an Autism Action Plan. As part of the plan, the FDA will issue a physician notice and initiate a safety label change on acetaminophen.
“We average about 150 calls a month, and I think in the last 24 hours, it’s maybe at 50 already with people worried and wanting to understand,” said Jennifer Korb, the executive director at the Autism Society of Colorado. She’s also a mom to a child with autism.
“Any nugget that you want to hold on to feels like ‘Aha. This is it.’ We all wish we had that,” said Korb.
She’s upset with the Trump Administration’s claims that taking Tylenol when pregnant can cause autism in children.
“Giving false hope or giving information that isn’t true just spins people down all these rabbit holes, and it doesn’t help people come to any sort of next steps or next plan for their family,” said Korb.
Dr. Bob Belknap, the executive director of the Public Health Institute at Denver Health, says he still recommends that pregnant women take Tylenol to treat high fevers or pain.
“The evidence says that there is this correlation,” said Belknap. “It’s relatively small, but there is this correlation between acetaminophen used during pregnancy and autism. We’re far away from knowing if that is meaningful in any way. In the meantime, acetaminophen, Tylenol remains the safest, most effective drug for treating fever and pain in pregnancy.”
Other parts of the Autism Action Plan include allocating more than $50 million to fund 13 research projects, and action by the FDA “to establish the first recognized therapeutic — leucovorin” which the plan states could help with symptoms in certain people with autism.
“There was some research, a relatively small study, demonstrating that children with fairly severe autism, who were nonverbal and were enrolled in a trial and received leucovorin, had some pretty dramatic improvements in their verbal abilities,” said Belknap. “It is a spectrum it’s believed to be multifactorial in the causes, and so also not likely that any single medication is going to be beneficial or treat all, all children with autism, and so a lot, lot, lot still to learn there, but the results of this early study were certainly encouraging.”
Belknap says anyone with questions about their medications should still speak to their physician.
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