The President’s Preferred Painkiller
Trading Tylenol for Tinfoil and the Definitive Proof That Science Still Exists
For those of us who still cling, somewhat desperately, to the quaint notion that science should guide public health policy, the past few months of the Second Trump Administration have been less a governing period and more a prolonged, agonizing performance art piece titled The Death of Empiricism.
We are operating, you see, in an administration where the President’s own gut—that magnificent, self-proclaimed genius organ—is considered the ultimate source of all verifiable knowledge, superseding centuries of established scientific methodology, double-blind trials, and, you know, actual medical expertise. It is a reality that feels increasingly like a fever dream one cannot sweat out, and the recent national pronouncement on acetaminophen—or, as the common folk know it, Tylenol—was a perfect, and perfectly dangerous, distillation of this philosophy.
In September of this tumultuous second term, flanked by his newly installed Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President Trump used the bully pulpit of the Oval Office to announce an alleged link between the use of paracetamol (acetaminophen) during pregnancy and an increased risk of autism in children [1], [2]. “Tylenol is not good. All right, I’ll say it; it’s not good,” the President proclaimed, based not on any new, peer-reviewed data, but on, presumably, a feeling he had that morning, perhaps while perusing his social media feed or simply contemplating the sheer volume of "stuff" women ingest.
It was a statement delivered with the characteristic confidence of a man who believes that merely asserting something makes it fact. It was also, predictably, a catastrophic piece of public health misinformation.
The Science of the Gut Feeling: How We Got Here
Let’s be clear about the rhetorical tactic at play here, because it is as repetitive as it is destructive. This administration did not just announce a concern; they leveraged the profound anxiety of parents and pregnant people—a population already drowning in health-related guilt and sleepless nights—to further the administration’s long-standing, politically motivated effort to undermine established medical consensus. This Tylenol claim arrived packaged neatly with renewed, and long-debunked, suggestions that the recommended childhood vaccination schedule contributes to autism rates [1], [2].
The President, who has a decade-long history of questioning vaccine safety [4], simply took an existing, low-confidence scientific hypothesis—that there might be a statistical correlation in some flawed observational studies between heavy acetaminophen use and certain neurodevelopmental outcomes—and declared it a presidential fait accompli. Without citing a single piece of new evidence, the administration moved to elevate a tenuous statistical correlation (which is not causation, a concept clearly too nuanced for a man whose mind operates on bumper-sticker slogans) into a terrifying public health warning.
The response from actual doctors and scientists at the time was immediate and incandescent. Experts were quick to point out that this was nothing more than “word salad” and that “Science isn’t based off vibes or hunches” [2]. But in the age of alternative facts, a White House press conference carries the weight of a decree, planting seeds of doubt that are notoriously difficult to uproot. The real danger here wasn't just the lie itself, but the downstream consequence: causing women to forgo essential pain and fever relief during pregnancy—relief that, if avoided, can lead to much more serious complications for both mother and fetus. A reckless pronouncement, made purely for political gain, putting real people in actual danger. Such is the daily grind of this particular presidency.
The Adult Supervision Arrives: An Umbrella Review to Douse the Flames
Thankfully, science is not a matter of opinion or a topic for executive fiat; it is a discipline of verification, replication, and the agonizing process of evidence gathering. And just weeks after the President’s declaration attempted to throw the entire medical community into chaos, the grown-ups in the room published their work.
Enter the brilliant minds at the University of Liverpool, who—in what one can only assume was a direct, exasperated response to the noise coming out of Washington—conducted a comprehensive umbrella review of the existing evidence [3].
Now, for those blissfully unaware of the hierarchy of evidence, an umbrella review is not just a study; it’s a study of other studies—specifically, a review of existing systematic reviews and meta-analyses. It sits at the absolute pinnacle of the evidence pyramid, essentially acting as the scientific Supreme Court to rule on all the lower-level evidence that came before it. This is the scientific community effectively saying: Enough with the speculation, let’s see what the most robust, aggregated data actually says.
The Liverpool team, led by Professor Shakila Thangaratinam, meticulously assessed nine systematic reviews that covered 40 observational studies on acetaminophen and neurodevelopmental conditions like autism and Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). What they found was not a smoking gun, but a heap of wildly shoddy methodology.
The Devil is in the Confounding Variables
The researchers’ findings were devastating, not to acetaminophen, but to the quality of the prior research that the administration's claims leaned on. Their assessment of the previous reviews consistently rated confidence in the findings as low or, in most cases, critically low [3]. This means the data was so poorly gathered or analyzed that any conclusions drawn from it were essentially worthless.
The critical flaw in the previous observational studies, which the Liverpool team highlighted with surgical precision, was their consistent failure to adjust for confounding variables [3].
Let’s break down the absurd simplification Trump and his team pushed:
Observation: Children whose mothers took Tylenol during pregnancy also developed autism.
Trump’s Conclusion (Causation by fiat): Tylenol caused the autism.
The Rational Conclusion (Accounting for Reality): Children whose mothers took Tylenol often did so because the mothers were ill (fever, infection, pain). Those mothers may have also been dealing with underlying conditions, lifestyle factors, or—most importantly—genetic predispositions that were actually responsible for the neurodevelopmental outcome.
The Liverpool researchers pointed out that only one of the previous reviews included studies that had correctly adjusted for these complex, shared factors (like parents' mental health, genetics, and socioeconomic status). In those two methodologically sound studies, the alleged link between Tylenol and autism or ADHD either vanished entirely or became so statistically weak as to be non-credible [3].
“Through this work, we have shown that based on current evidence, there is no clear link between women taking paracetamol during pregnancy and a diagnosis of autism or ADHD in their children,” stated Professor Thangaratinam [3].
There it is. The definitive, evidence-based answer, standing as a quiet, authoritative rebuttal to the cacophony of politically motivated scaremongering. The risk, as it turns out, is not in the acetaminophen; the risk is in listening to a President who treats the complex world of medical science like a reality television script where facts are interchangeable with personal feelings.
The Daily Disappointment and the Path Back to Reality
The entire episode is a microcosm of why this second term feels so profoundly dangerous. We have a commander-in-chief who consistently fails to distinguish between what he wishes were true and what the verifiable evidence dictates. He uses the power of the presidency to platform thoroughly discredited anti-science rhetoric, all while millions of families are left bewildered, terrified, and, potentially, at risk. The sheer absurdity of a nation having to wait for scientists in Liverpool to publish a systematic take-down of its President’s baseless health advice should fill every sensible citizen with a deep, weary lamentation.
It is a profound and daily disappointment to witness the American experiment being actively sabotaged by a willful disregard for expertise and consensus. This isn't just policy disagreement; it’s an attack on the foundational values of truth and rationality that hold a civil society together.
We deserve better. Our pregnant citizens deserve better. Our children deserve leaders who look at a problem—whether it’s a pandemic, climate change, or the causes of autism—and ask, “What does the evidence say?” not “What feels right to me?”
So, let the final word be the science itself: Pregnant women, please consult your actual doctors, not the current occupant of the White House. The University of Liverpool, publishing in The BMJ, has performed the public service of cleaning up the mess left by the President and his Health Secretary. The data is clear. The noise from Washington is not.
It is high time we stop rewarding the carnival barker and start listening to the scientists. The pursuit of facts, decency, and the rule of law must remain our collective aspiration, even as we document this daily descent into presidential irrationality. Otherwise, we risk trading the very real relief of Tylenol for the metaphorical headache of endless, fact-free paranoia.
References
[1] Associated Press, "Trump makes unfounded claims about Tylenol, vaccines and autism - AP News," Sept. 22, 2025. https://apnews.com/article/tylenol-cause-autism-trump-kennedy-0847ee76eedecbd5e9baa6888b567d66
[2] CIDRAP, "Experts push back on Trump's tying autism to childhood vaccines, Tylenol," Sept. 23, 2025. https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/public-health/experts-push-back-trumps-tying-autism-childhood-vaccines-tylenol
[3] B. Thompson, "No credible tie between Tylenol use and autism/ADHD, huge study finds," New Atlas, Nov. 9, 2025. https://newatlas.com/adhd-autism/low-concern-tylenol-adhd-or-autism/
[4] Time Magazine, "'There's Something Causing It.' Trump Draws False Link Between Vaccines and Autism in TIME Interview," Dec. 12, 2024. https://time.com/7201582/donald-trump-vaccines-fact-check-2024/
