A study published in The Lancet medical journal looked at hospital data of emergency department visits in the months before and after Trump warned in September against taking acetaminophen, commonly marketed as Tylenol, while pregnant.
He made this recommendation due to the claim that it could be linked to autism in children, despite there being no new data to support this. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had pledged to find the cause of autism by September.
"Taking Tylenol is not good," Trump said. "Fight like hell not to take it."
The study found that orders for acetaminophen among pregnant emergency department patients aged between 15 and 44 fell by 10 percent while no significant change in acetaminophen use was found among nonpregnant female emergency department patients in the same age range.
"Although causal claims cannot be made, the observed associations are consistent with influence of new FDA recommendations on clinical decisions," the study stated.
"It is unknown whether the results reported reflect changes in patient demand or clinician decision making; nonetheless, they show the apparent power that public authority figures have to drive sudden changes in health-care practices."
During the same briefing in which Trump warned against taking acetaminophen, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Marty Makary said his agency would be promoting leucovorin, a form of the B vitamin folic acid, as a way of reducing autism symptoms.
A change in leucovorin uptake was also observed by the study, with outpatient leucovorin prescriptions for children between 5 and 17 years of age jumping by 71 percent in the study period.
The authors noted that the recommendations coming from the White House were based on "low-quality evidence," yet was still enough to increase interest despite there being "no new data."
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