Medical experts and health agencies, including the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), have consistently found no link between childhood vaccinations and autism.
US President Donald Trump on Monday claimed that the use of acetaminophen (commonly known as Tylenol) during pregnancy “can be associated with a very increased risk of autism,” and urged pregnant women not to take Tylenol.ย He also raised unfounded concerns about vaccines given to babies.
Speaking from the Oval Office, Trump stated that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) would soon notify physicians to limit the recommendation of Tylenol during pregnancy unless “medically necessary,” such as for the treatment of fever, adding, “if you can’t tough it out.”
During the briefing, Trump also questioned existing childhood vaccine protocols, calling for delays in the administration of vaccines like the hepatitis B shot, which is currently given to newborns. He suggested that “too many different things are going into that baby,” though he provided no scientific evidence to support his claim.
The Trump administration is facing mounting pressure from Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr.’s broad-based Make America Healthy Again movement to explain the sharp rise in autism cases reported in the United States in recent years.
Whatย did the experts say?
According to CNN, researchers broadly agree that autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is caused by a complex combination of genetic and environmental factors, and the data regarding any potential link between acetaminophen and autism remains inconclusive and evolving.
Experts attribute the rise in autism casesย to a new definition for the disorder that now includes mild cases on a “spectrum” and better diagnoses.ย They say there is no single cause to the disorder and say the rhetoric appears to ignore and undermine decades of scientific research pointing to genetic and environmental factors.
The announcement is the latest step the administration, driven by Kennedy and his supporters, has taken to reshape America’s public health landscape.
Beyond funding cuts at federal health agencies, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been rattled by disputes over Kennedy’s controversial vaccine policies. Last week, an influential immunization panel stocked by Kennedy with figures who have been critical of vaccines changed shot guidance for COVID-19 and other diseases.
Public health experts argue the administration is overselling what it can achieve in its first year, stressing that much more research is needed to determine whether environmental factors play a role in autism.
Kennedy for years has promoted debunked theories that vaccines could be responsible for rising rates of autism, which affects 1 in 31 US children today, according to the CDC. Scientists, doctors and researchers have attributed that increase instead to greater awareness of the disorder and the newer, wide-ranging “spectrum” used to issue diagnoses for people with milder expressions of autism. It’s hard to tell if there may be additional factors behind the increase.ย
(With AP inputs)
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