Major review debunks link between paracetamol use in pregnancy and autism in children

Since US President Donald Trump linked paracetamol to autism in children in September — telling pregnant women to “fight like hell” to avoid taking the common painkiller — the global scientific community has been hotly debating the validity of the claim.

A new in-depth review of existing evidence published in The BMJ on Monday found there was no clear link between paracetamol use during pregnancy and autism or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) diagnoses in children, Euronews writes.

The new research was conducted by researchers from major universities and institutions in the United Kingdom, Australia, and Spain.

“We wanted to do a review of all the reviews in the space to make sense of what the evidence is so far,” said Shakila Thangaratinam, one of the study’s authors and a women’s health professor at the University of Liverpool.

In the BMJ review, researchers analyzed nine existing systematic reviews on the topic to assess the overall quality and scientific validity of the claims.

All nine reviews reported a link between paracetamol use in pregnancy and autism or ADHD in children. But the BMJ researchers found that many of these studies did not adjust for important health and lifestyle factors, and that many multi-study reviews were poor quality.

Paracetamol, also known as acetaminophen, is a common pain reliever sold under the brand name Tylenol in the United States. It is one of the only over-the-counter medicines recommended for pregnant women to treat pain and fever.

To coincide with Trump’s news conference in September, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recommended changing the labels on paracetamol packaging to note the “evidence suggesting that the use of acetaminophen by pregnant women may be associated with an increased risk of neurological conditions such as autism and ADHD in children.”