Sept. 22, 2025
What You Need To Know Ahead of Trump’s Major Autism Announcement
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RSS Feed Amy and T.J. did a deep dive on the recent and conflicting research on whether acetaminophen- the active ingredient in Tylenol - has a proven link to an increased risk of Autism.
From some of the most respected scientific minds - we’re talking Harvard, Johns Hopkins and JAMA - there is no simple explanation, so why are Trump and RFK Jr claiming they have the answer?
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
00:00:02
Speaker 1: Hey, folks, it is Monday, September the twenty second, and the stock is dropping for a company called kin Vu. You know who they are, Well, they're the ones that make thailandol. And right now all eyes are on tailan al and a possible connection to autism. Welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ. This is a big day, a big announcement, and Robes is already stirring controversy on what has been a controversial topic. We are expecting the President to come out. I mean, this is essentially a bombshell, that's right.
00:00:39
Speaker 2: I mean he already basically announced it during the Charlie Kirk memorial service and then reiterated it on the plane back on Air Force one to reporters. But he believes this is going to be a historic medical announcement. But it certainly has a lot of people and scientists within the medical community concerned.
00:01:01
Speaker 1: What was the word he used. We think we figured out we have an answer.
00:01:05
Speaker 3: An answer to the autism problem.
00:01:07
Speaker 1: He said that during Charlie Kirk's memorial service yesterday. They've been talking about this Robes for a while. Rfka Junior several months back, like all our eyes got big. Essentially talking about they're gonna cure or end autism or fix it or find the answer. This is what they were talking about. And they said the announcement was going to come in September.
00:01:26
Speaker 2: Here we are, Yeah, they said, in five months, we will have the answer for autism. And look, this is a disorder that has puzzled and plagued parents for decades now. There has been so much research and so much time and energy and money to try and figure out what happens. Because imagine you've got this sweet, beautiful, healthy baby, and then around two or three, all of a sudden, you realize your child maybe doesn't have the verbal skills that other children have, they don't have the seeming like emotional connection that other children have. You you know, something's off with your child and you can't figure out why, and you don't have really anything in your arsenal.
00:02:08
Speaker 3: What can you do?
00:02:10
Speaker 2: And it's really frustrating to watch your child not develop the way maybe your other children have or other children around them have.
00:02:17
Speaker 1: It's so difficult because so young, and you just mentioned two or three is when they identify. They finally diagnose around the age of five. But for a parent, I mean, so you don't want to take away now. I mean, there are plenty of people out there, adults living full lives who are on the autism spectrum. There are plenty of families out there are happy and raising happy children who are on the autism spectrum. But still that is a devastating diagnosis for a parent who to your point, I didn't think of it necessarily that way, Like everything seems fine because their baby, everything's great, and they get wait, wait.
00:02:48
Speaker 3: A minute, somebody's happen right, what's happening?
00:02:50
Speaker 4: And then the other problem with that, too is.
00:02:53
Speaker 3: Parents start to blame themselves. I had my.
00:02:56
Speaker 2: Baby too late, maybe I didn't eat the right things while I was pregnant, start doing the blame game, and so that there are so many layers to this, because you do feel guilt, but there are so many scientists and researchers who believe there is such a genetic component that it isn't anyone's fault, that it isn't anything the mother did during pregnancy. But this would this new announcement could suggest otherwise you hit.
00:03:21
Speaker 1: It there to any parent who was ever, I guess it's probably natural to think that, and what do I do wrong? Doctors have definitely, definitively said you have done nothing wrong. That is the consensus in the medical field. You haven't done anything wrong, because they have no frickin' idea right what causes it? They've been studying this for so long they still the answer is we don't know what causes autism. The White House and from the Oval Office today, I don't know what language they're going to use, because language and words are very important in this case. What are they going to say. If they are going to say that thailanol and acida metaphine, the active ingredient in there, causes autism, that's huge and every doctor in the world is going to say, show me.
00:04:10
Speaker 2: That proof because right now, and there are some studies out there, some recent studies that have shown possible links, but certainly not a causation. And there is a difference between correlation and causation, and that is significant. But yes, words will matter, and we will be listening closely to this press conference. We're expecting RFK Junior and meme at Oz correct doctor Oz as well. So these are two people who are controversial figures within the healthcare community who will be leading this press conference. And it yes, what they say and specifically how they word this will have a huge impact not just on the medical community, on doctors and their patients and parents. But yes, you even mentioned the stock price right now of the company that owns TIL and All is at a historic low, a fifty two week load, just based on the speculation about what they may say today at that press cont.
00:05:06
Speaker 1: Because that's huge if they're going to make a connection and tell people now, because you understood and age this is common knowledge women. I said, you're pregnant. Women told they can't take advil. You say, pregnant women told they can't take anything.
00:05:20
Speaker 2: We really can't take I mean nothing. It was actually shocking. I didn't realize how much I wasn't able to take. You can't take really any medicine whatsoever. I remember being told I could take tailan al and I could take benadryl, but certainly not whenever I wanted. It had to be very specific, and it had to be I had to really need it.
00:05:39
Speaker 3: I really had to need both of them.
00:05:41
Speaker 2: And that's you know, you don't drink alcohol, you don't take medications, you don't you don't eat lunch meat, you don't eat sushi. There are a lot of things that women don't eat and consume that they normally would while they're pregnant.
00:05:52
Speaker 1: So to your point about the stock price, then the idea that the one thing women have been told you can't, that's the one thing that possibly calls your child's autism. I just imagine lawsuits towards doctors, government, the company. I'm surprised that stock hasn't fallen more than it has.
00:06:14
Speaker 3: To be honest with you, I am too.
00:06:17
Speaker 2: Actually, we'll wait and see what happens after this announcement, because look, when this there was a study that came out at the beginning of September. This was the Harvard study, or at least it's certainly one of two studies that came out. Stock prices have been dipping now for the past two weeks, and then it got leaked that this is likely what the Trump administration was going to say, so that if you go and look at the stock market, you know, it looks like an EKG or whatever if it goes up, and you can see exactly when those studies came out at the beginning of this month and even some in August, I believe you can just see it starting to steadily drop and then as of I.
00:06:50
Speaker 3: Believe yesterday it just plummeted, plummeted.
00:06:56
Speaker 1: Well, and again you say the words matter, and we'll get into these studies and let's go back, and I said, this, can most people really under do we know what even autism is? So backing up just a little bit about what we're talking about asd autism spectrum disorder characterized by changes with social skills, repetitive behavior, speech, and nonverbal communication. It's considered a neuro divergence. It simply means the brain doesn't work the way it's supposed to. It works differently from other brains for unexplained reasons. One in thirty one children in the US affected, one in forty five adults. We talk about this, there is a range that's not just one type. Everybody has similar but different challenges. Some people can speak, someone nonverbal, some are limited in how they communicate. But it's called and that's why they call it the spectrum. There is an autism spectrum.
00:07:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, I have within the spectrum too. You can have Asperger syndrome. So there's just so many different variants, hundreds I believe of what autism, what that umbrella and how many people are impacted and affected. But yes, you're typically diagnosed around the age of five. But as I mentioned, because I do have a friend who started noticing when their child was about two or three that he was just not acting like his older siblings. And she was told, and a lot of parents are told early intervention is important. But that is a tremendous amount of costs. I mean you're talking about just the emotional and that part of it, but then there's a financial one as well, because most people, yes, want to get their children immediately into intense early intervention where you have a special school and you have a special teacher, where your child is given one on one directions that they can actually because a lot of kids who are autistic are brilliant. Their brains work differently, but some of them are highly functioning and savants in a.
00:08:45
Speaker 3: Lot of ways.
00:08:45
Speaker 2: But you have to have the right sort of training and the right sort of focus and direction, and that comes from specialized teachers who then cost a lot of money. So yes, this is all this is a huge, huge, huge issue on multiple levels.
00:09:00
Speaker 1: A huge day if the government is going to tell women to stop possibly taking Thailandol, and this is possibly going to bring down autism numbers. I guess that's great, But what is the president on the plane? What was it? He said on the way back, in a suggestion that hey, it's no harm, what the hell, might as well try it.
00:09:22
Speaker 3: It seemed kind of flipping it boiled down to that basically.
00:09:25
Speaker 2: But yes, he drops this bomb in the middle of the Charlie Kirk Memorial service, and of course the second he gets on the plane, reporters we knew this was.
00:09:32
Speaker 3: Going to happen.
00:09:33
Speaker 2: Excuse me, President Trump, what was that bomb that you just dropped in the middle of the memorial service? So they asked him specifically about it, because there had been rumors at that point that the Trump administration and certainly RFK Junior, were likely going to make this connection, this correlation between a seed of menaphin, which is the ingredient, the active ingredient in thailanol, and autism. And so he said, I think it's a very big factor referring to a seed of menaphin. And then he said this, if there's a question, even if there's a question, you just do it right. And that's the problem with a lot of folks in the medical community because there are always repercussions for making.
00:10:10
Speaker 3: A bold statement like that.
00:10:11
Speaker 2: It's not as if there's no harm, because truly, if a pregnant woman has a high fever or massive inflammation, some sort of an infection, she cannot take advil, she cannot take a lot of these drugs that we would take if we weren't pregnant. Her only option right now is tailanol. And so if she can't take thailanol, now there are increased risks to the fetus if you have a high fever, if you have an infection, if you have massive inflammation. And there is also emotional impacts they say depression, anxiety, because you're in pain, you can't do anything about it, and that can transfer to the fetus as well.
00:10:47
Speaker 4: So if there's a question, even if there's a question, you just do it.
00:10:51
Speaker 1: Right, spoken like a non doctor, right. Absolutely. That is not how you make public health policy. That's any doctor will tell you. You just don't know whim. The reason we're here is because there's been study after study after study. They show different things, different connections, but every one of them the conclusion is the same. We don't know what causes.
00:11:15
Speaker 2: Autism, and I think there is a consensus from everything we've read that it's fairly well believed that there isn't just one thing that's causing autism. There are and genetics and what you inherit have a huge role, they believe right now. So even in these studies, think about it, you know, you get your head around. You can't really have a controlled group because each child you're studying comes from a different type of DNA, and they're inheriting different genetics, and then they have different lifestyles, and their families eat different things and drink different things, and are active, and some are more active than others. So they did do some studies with siblings to try and even it out, but it's really hard to pinpoint such a broad spectrum the disorder entails and then have all of these factors. You can't say, oh, here's the one thing that's causing autism.
00:12:02
Speaker 3: That makes zero sense.
00:12:03
Speaker 1: Well, folks, if you think you're confused, now wait until we read you the headlines, very recent headlines about what the latest studies from some of the most prestigious medical institutions in the world have said about autism and Thailand all and get this, they don't all agree at all. We continue now as of this recording, we are waiting, folks on an announcement from the Open Office about autism. The President and the RK Jr. The HHS Secretary promise several months back that we are going to figure out have an answer for autism by September, and here we are. They're going to make an announcement. Robes. The President pretty viewed it kind of out of nowhere. I'm not sure if that was planned or not.
00:13:00
Speaker 3: I don't think he was in the prompter.
00:13:01
Speaker 1: I was he might have been planned in his own head. But yes, said there's gonna be I keep forgetting the word. We have an answer. Yes, we have an answer for autism, and we're going to get that answer this afternoon. We just decided to jump on and give you a quick preview here because some of the studies Robes say this and I quote headline. Mount Sinai study supports evidence that prenatal aceta metaphin use may be linked to increase risk of autism and ADHD. Is that not clear as day? Yes, when you read the headline, then you have to get into some of the details. It said. Yes, their researchers found that exposure to aceda metaphon talenol may increase the risk of disorders like autism spectrum. However, they say in the same article, while the study does not show it directly causes neural developmental disorders, the research team's finding strengthen the evidence for a connection and raise concerns about current clinical practices. They go on to just call for cautious time limited use of aceta metaphine during pregnancy until more answers can be found. That sounds like we just don't know will be cautious, Ask your doctor. But they headlines and there are studies out there that say that there is a link. They find the connection or an increase of some kind.
00:14:22
Speaker 2: Harvard School of Public Health, how about this for a headline, using aceta metaphine during pregnancy may increase children's autism and ADHD risk.
00:14:32
Speaker 1: That's got to be confusing, right, I mean Harvard, And that's the headline from Harvard.
00:14:37
Speaker 2: Yes, And Harvard goes on to say we recommend judicious aceta metaphine use, lowest effective dose, shortest duration under medical guidance tailored to individual risk benefit assessments rather than a broad limitation. Look, I don't know what the current guidelines are. I just know from when I was pregnant, and granted that it was I guess nineteen years ago was my last pregnancy, but I knew my doctors told me you aren't supposed to be taking anything unless you absolutely need to. It's just you don't get the liberal whatever you want to take to make yourself feel better in the moment, including a glass of wine, like.
00:15:12
Speaker 3: You know, it was the strictest of guidelines.
00:15:14
Speaker 2: And look, when you're growing this human inside of you, you recognize you have to do things differently and you have to be thinking of your child first. But so just seeing a headline like this, even if now other doctors refute it and say this is not likely, this is not do you actually think you're gonna feel totally okay popping a til and all Now that this is all being aired out out of an abundance of caution, I would say I probably would suffer through. And I had headaches and it was tough, it was hard. I had to actually I couldn't drink coffee, so I had to go through caffeine withdrawal and I had to deal with the headaches.
00:15:48
Speaker 3: So even if I thought about.
00:15:50
Speaker 2: Taking tile and all, because you're like, oh, you can take tilt all. I would probably not do it just in case.
00:15:55
Speaker 1: But to your point earlier as well, that we heard a doctor mentioned that comes with risks as well to telling women who are in pain not to take it.
00:16:02
Speaker 2: Now, I'm stressed, now, I'm angry, now, I'm frustrated. Now if any other thing happens on top of my pain, now, I'm not handling things well emotionally, and that does transfer to your child.
00:16:13
Speaker 1: Johns Hopkins, same thing, headline, taking thailand al during pregnancy associated with elevated risks for autism. Those are headlines for these big names. Now they go on to say the researcher points out that although the study found a consistent association between biomarkers of aceta metaphant and it's wh blah blah blah metapic in cord blood, it said it should not be interpreted that thailanol use causes these disorders. So the headline says one thing, thailand all during pregnancy associated with elevated risk. Then they go down and say it should not be interpreted that taileran all use causes these disorders. It's just confusing.
00:16:55
Speaker 2: It's incredibly, incredibly confusing, especially then when you look at the largest study out there, funded by the National Institutes of Health, A new study from JAMMA research shows no casual link between thailanol and autism. A new study from JAMMA found that using a set of menaphin, the active ingredient in thailenol, during pregnancy, was not associated with increased risk of autism, ADHD, or intellectual disability in children. So now you have a completely opposite headline by a incredibly well regarded organization and funded by the National Institutes of Health saying the exact opposite of what we just heard.
00:17:42
Speaker 1: Okay, I've been what are the words causation, correlation, association, all these things. Correlation versus causation. Correlation just means the two things are existing and they're in some way connected, but it doesn't mean that one causes the correlation versus causation. Causation directly means this thing causes that thing, correct, And that's the difference. I saw a great example, and I'm so sorry I can't give them credit for it. Between causation and correlation. It's silly, but it's simple. The sun hot day, the sun is beaming down on you, and you eating ice cream, the sun comes down on you and you get sunburn. The sun comes down, it melts the ice cream.
00:18:27
Speaker 3: That's causation.
00:18:27
Speaker 1: The sun directly calls the ice cream to melt, directly cause you to get sunburned. But just because your sunburn, that doesn't mean your ice cream is gonna melt. That's correlation. Wow, caud it was so interesting how they put that two things are related. They both exist under these same conditions. But the ice cream melting didn't cause your sunburn, and the sunburn didn't cause ice cream and melt. Even though they're correlated based on the environment, that actually.
00:18:56
Speaker 3: Is a helpful way to explain the difference.
00:18:58
Speaker 1: God, I want to give them credit. Whoever put that out, thank you. I'm sorry I cannot remember, but that's how they explained and that made perfect sense to me.
00:19:05
Speaker 3: That absolutely does.
00:19:06
Speaker 2: And yet still just this headline alone will instill fear in women who are pregnant period at the.
00:19:14
Speaker 1: Bot where's the entail and all put out a statement and they have a big thing on their website as well, trying to explain things.
00:19:21
Speaker 2: Yes, they write on their website, we understand the recent media coverage you're reading may cause concern or lead to questions. We want to make sure you have the answers. So they say this, here is what we can tell you. Credible independent scientific data continues to show no proven link between taking acid of metaphine and autism. Medical and public health organizations agree, and then they say this includes the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the Society for Maternal Fetal Medicine, Autism Science Foundation, and the US Food and Drug Administration, which that may change given this new headline and these new recommendations that we make be getting from RFK Junior, who is in charge of AHHS, and certainly the FDA is under that umbrella. So for now that holds true. But there and I appreciate this. They say, our best advice talk to your healthcare professional before taking or administering acet of metaphine period.
00:20:20
Speaker 4: And that makes sense. I mean, that's and it should be on.
00:20:22
Speaker 3: A case by case basis. It should be sure.
00:20:25
Speaker 2: I think it's fair to say you should limit the time on all you're taking or anything you're taking, and you have to be careful about what you eat and what you drink and how much you exercise.
00:20:34
Speaker 3: In all of that. When you're pregnant.
00:20:36
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, other to your point about other factors, people overweight, folks have different factors that factor into some of this. They were saying age could factor into some of this.
00:20:47
Speaker 3: That's huge.
00:20:48
Speaker 2: I you know, it's one of those when you're pregnant over the age of thirty five, you're considered a geriatric pregnant woman, which seems silly, but it's true in terms of the viability and just the overall health of your eggs. And they say once you go over that age, every year your risk of a lot of things increases, including autism, and so age is a huge factor.
00:21:10
Speaker 1: Well, folks, we are keeping an eye on this one today. Just wanted to preview and let you know what's out there before you as you get prepared to hear what's coming. And we will be watching and we will certainly update you again again. Top right corner of your Apple podcast app on our show page, a little button says follow Just click that you can get our updates coming right to you. And there have been a lot of them that we'll check in with you again, but for now I'm TJ's home, so on behalf of my No you want to jump again, what you say your name.
00:21:36
Speaker 2: Oh no, no, no, I thought maybe you kind of messed up your name, so I was I was laughing at you. I thought you kind of slurred your TJ home, so I was just laughing at you.
00:21:43
Speaker 3: I didn't want to jump in.
00:21:44
Speaker 1: I'm trying to recover that. It's just been a rough weekend. You weren't here and I was a mess.
00:21:48
Speaker 4: All right, so on behalf of TJ Holmes.
00:21:51
Speaker 3: I'm Amy Roboch. We will talk to you again soon
Speaker 1: Hey, folks, it is Monday, September the twenty second, and the stock is dropping for a company called kin Vu. You know who they are, Well, they're the ones that make thailandol. And right now all eyes are on tailan al and a possible connection to autism. Welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ. This is a big day, a big announcement, and Robes is already stirring controversy on what has been a controversial topic. We are expecting the President to come out. I mean, this is essentially a bombshell, that's right.
00:00:39
Speaker 2: I mean he already basically announced it during the Charlie Kirk memorial service and then reiterated it on the plane back on Air Force one to reporters. But he believes this is going to be a historic medical announcement. But it certainly has a lot of people and scientists within the medical community concerned.
00:01:01
Speaker 1: What was the word he used. We think we figured out we have an answer.
00:01:05
Speaker 3: An answer to the autism problem.
00:01:07
Speaker 1: He said that during Charlie Kirk's memorial service yesterday. They've been talking about this Robes for a while. Rfka Junior several months back, like all our eyes got big. Essentially talking about they're gonna cure or end autism or fix it or find the answer. This is what they were talking about. And they said the announcement was going to come in September.
00:01:26
Speaker 2: Here we are, Yeah, they said, in five months, we will have the answer for autism. And look, this is a disorder that has puzzled and plagued parents for decades now. There has been so much research and so much time and energy and money to try and figure out what happens. Because imagine you've got this sweet, beautiful, healthy baby, and then around two or three, all of a sudden, you realize your child maybe doesn't have the verbal skills that other children have, they don't have the seeming like emotional connection that other children have. You you know, something's off with your child and you can't figure out why, and you don't have really anything in your arsenal.
00:02:08
Speaker 3: What can you do?
00:02:10
Speaker 2: And it's really frustrating to watch your child not develop the way maybe your other children have or other children around them have.
00:02:17
Speaker 1: It's so difficult because so young, and you just mentioned two or three is when they identify. They finally diagnose around the age of five. But for a parent, I mean, so you don't want to take away now. I mean, there are plenty of people out there, adults living full lives who are on the autism spectrum. There are plenty of families out there are happy and raising happy children who are on the autism spectrum. But still that is a devastating diagnosis for a parent who to your point, I didn't think of it necessarily that way, Like everything seems fine because their baby, everything's great, and they get wait, wait.
00:02:48
Speaker 3: A minute, somebody's happen right, what's happening?
00:02:50
Speaker 4: And then the other problem with that, too is.
00:02:53
Speaker 3: Parents start to blame themselves. I had my.
00:02:56
Speaker 2: Baby too late, maybe I didn't eat the right things while I was pregnant, start doing the blame game, and so that there are so many layers to this, because you do feel guilt, but there are so many scientists and researchers who believe there is such a genetic component that it isn't anyone's fault, that it isn't anything the mother did during pregnancy. But this would this new announcement could suggest otherwise you hit.
00:03:21
Speaker 1: It there to any parent who was ever, I guess it's probably natural to think that, and what do I do wrong? Doctors have definitely, definitively said you have done nothing wrong. That is the consensus in the medical field. You haven't done anything wrong, because they have no frickin' idea right what causes it? They've been studying this for so long they still the answer is we don't know what causes autism. The White House and from the Oval Office today, I don't know what language they're going to use, because language and words are very important in this case. What are they going to say. If they are going to say that thailanol and acida metaphine, the active ingredient in there, causes autism, that's huge and every doctor in the world is going to say, show me.
00:04:10
Speaker 2: That proof because right now, and there are some studies out there, some recent studies that have shown possible links, but certainly not a causation. And there is a difference between correlation and causation, and that is significant. But yes, words will matter, and we will be listening closely to this press conference. We're expecting RFK Junior and meme at Oz correct doctor Oz as well. So these are two people who are controversial figures within the healthcare community who will be leading this press conference. And it yes, what they say and specifically how they word this will have a huge impact not just on the medical community, on doctors and their patients and parents. But yes, you even mentioned the stock price right now of the company that owns TIL and All is at a historic low, a fifty two week load, just based on the speculation about what they may say today at that press cont.
00:05:06
Speaker 1: Because that's huge if they're going to make a connection and tell people now, because you understood and age this is common knowledge women. I said, you're pregnant. Women told they can't take advil. You say, pregnant women told they can't take anything.
00:05:20
Speaker 2: We really can't take I mean nothing. It was actually shocking. I didn't realize how much I wasn't able to take. You can't take really any medicine whatsoever. I remember being told I could take tailan al and I could take benadryl, but certainly not whenever I wanted. It had to be very specific, and it had to be I had to really need it.
00:05:39
Speaker 3: I really had to need both of them.
00:05:41
Speaker 2: And that's you know, you don't drink alcohol, you don't take medications, you don't you don't eat lunch meat, you don't eat sushi. There are a lot of things that women don't eat and consume that they normally would while they're pregnant.
00:05:52
Speaker 1: So to your point about the stock price, then the idea that the one thing women have been told you can't, that's the one thing that possibly calls your child's autism. I just imagine lawsuits towards doctors, government, the company. I'm surprised that stock hasn't fallen more than it has.
00:06:14
Speaker 3: To be honest with you, I am too.
00:06:17
Speaker 2: Actually, we'll wait and see what happens after this announcement, because look, when this there was a study that came out at the beginning of September. This was the Harvard study, or at least it's certainly one of two studies that came out. Stock prices have been dipping now for the past two weeks, and then it got leaked that this is likely what the Trump administration was going to say, so that if you go and look at the stock market, you know, it looks like an EKG or whatever if it goes up, and you can see exactly when those studies came out at the beginning of this month and even some in August, I believe you can just see it starting to steadily drop and then as of I.
00:06:50
Speaker 3: Believe yesterday it just plummeted, plummeted.
00:06:56
Speaker 1: Well, and again you say the words matter, and we'll get into these studies and let's go back, and I said, this, can most people really under do we know what even autism is? So backing up just a little bit about what we're talking about asd autism spectrum disorder characterized by changes with social skills, repetitive behavior, speech, and nonverbal communication. It's considered a neuro divergence. It simply means the brain doesn't work the way it's supposed to. It works differently from other brains for unexplained reasons. One in thirty one children in the US affected, one in forty five adults. We talk about this, there is a range that's not just one type. Everybody has similar but different challenges. Some people can speak, someone nonverbal, some are limited in how they communicate. But it's called and that's why they call it the spectrum. There is an autism spectrum.
00:07:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, I have within the spectrum too. You can have Asperger syndrome. So there's just so many different variants, hundreds I believe of what autism, what that umbrella and how many people are impacted and affected. But yes, you're typically diagnosed around the age of five. But as I mentioned, because I do have a friend who started noticing when their child was about two or three that he was just not acting like his older siblings. And she was told, and a lot of parents are told early intervention is important. But that is a tremendous amount of costs. I mean you're talking about just the emotional and that part of it, but then there's a financial one as well, because most people, yes, want to get their children immediately into intense early intervention where you have a special school and you have a special teacher, where your child is given one on one directions that they can actually because a lot of kids who are autistic are brilliant. Their brains work differently, but some of them are highly functioning and savants in a.
00:08:45
Speaker 3: Lot of ways.
00:08:45
Speaker 2: But you have to have the right sort of training and the right sort of focus and direction, and that comes from specialized teachers who then cost a lot of money. So yes, this is all this is a huge, huge, huge issue on multiple levels.
00:09:00
Speaker 1: A huge day if the government is going to tell women to stop possibly taking Thailandol, and this is possibly going to bring down autism numbers. I guess that's great, But what is the president on the plane? What was it? He said on the way back, in a suggestion that hey, it's no harm, what the hell, might as well try it.
00:09:22
Speaker 3: It seemed kind of flipping it boiled down to that basically.
00:09:25
Speaker 2: But yes, he drops this bomb in the middle of the Charlie Kirk Memorial service, and of course the second he gets on the plane, reporters we knew this was.
00:09:32
Speaker 3: Going to happen.
00:09:33
Speaker 2: Excuse me, President Trump, what was that bomb that you just dropped in the middle of the memorial service? So they asked him specifically about it, because there had been rumors at that point that the Trump administration and certainly RFK Junior, were likely going to make this connection, this correlation between a seed of menaphin, which is the ingredient, the active ingredient in thailanol, and autism. And so he said, I think it's a very big factor referring to a seed of menaphin. And then he said this, if there's a question, even if there's a question, you just do it right. And that's the problem with a lot of folks in the medical community because there are always repercussions for making.
00:10:10
Speaker 3: A bold statement like that.
00:10:11
Speaker 2: It's not as if there's no harm, because truly, if a pregnant woman has a high fever or massive inflammation, some sort of an infection, she cannot take advil, she cannot take a lot of these drugs that we would take if we weren't pregnant. Her only option right now is tailanol. And so if she can't take thailanol, now there are increased risks to the fetus if you have a high fever, if you have an infection, if you have massive inflammation. And there is also emotional impacts they say depression, anxiety, because you're in pain, you can't do anything about it, and that can transfer to the fetus as well.
00:10:47
Speaker 4: So if there's a question, even if there's a question, you just do it.
00:10:51
Speaker 1: Right, spoken like a non doctor, right. Absolutely. That is not how you make public health policy. That's any doctor will tell you. You just don't know whim. The reason we're here is because there's been study after study after study. They show different things, different connections, but every one of them the conclusion is the same. We don't know what causes.
00:11:15
Speaker 2: Autism, and I think there is a consensus from everything we've read that it's fairly well believed that there isn't just one thing that's causing autism. There are and genetics and what you inherit have a huge role, they believe right now. So even in these studies, think about it, you know, you get your head around. You can't really have a controlled group because each child you're studying comes from a different type of DNA, and they're inheriting different genetics, and then they have different lifestyles, and their families eat different things and drink different things, and are active, and some are more active than others. So they did do some studies with siblings to try and even it out, but it's really hard to pinpoint such a broad spectrum the disorder entails and then have all of these factors. You can't say, oh, here's the one thing that's causing autism.
00:12:02
Speaker 3: That makes zero sense.
00:12:03
Speaker 1: Well, folks, if you think you're confused, now wait until we read you the headlines, very recent headlines about what the latest studies from some of the most prestigious medical institutions in the world have said about autism and Thailand all and get this, they don't all agree at all. We continue now as of this recording, we are waiting, folks on an announcement from the Open Office about autism. The President and the RK Jr. The HHS Secretary promise several months back that we are going to figure out have an answer for autism by September, and here we are. They're going to make an announcement. Robes. The President pretty viewed it kind of out of nowhere. I'm not sure if that was planned or not.
00:13:00
Speaker 3: I don't think he was in the prompter.
00:13:01
Speaker 1: I was he might have been planned in his own head. But yes, said there's gonna be I keep forgetting the word. We have an answer. Yes, we have an answer for autism, and we're going to get that answer this afternoon. We just decided to jump on and give you a quick preview here because some of the studies Robes say this and I quote headline. Mount Sinai study supports evidence that prenatal aceta metaphin use may be linked to increase risk of autism and ADHD. Is that not clear as day? Yes, when you read the headline, then you have to get into some of the details. It said. Yes, their researchers found that exposure to aceda metaphon talenol may increase the risk of disorders like autism spectrum. However, they say in the same article, while the study does not show it directly causes neural developmental disorders, the research team's finding strengthen the evidence for a connection and raise concerns about current clinical practices. They go on to just call for cautious time limited use of aceta metaphine during pregnancy until more answers can be found. That sounds like we just don't know will be cautious, Ask your doctor. But they headlines and there are studies out there that say that there is a link. They find the connection or an increase of some kind.
00:14:22
Speaker 2: Harvard School of Public Health, how about this for a headline, using aceta metaphine during pregnancy may increase children's autism and ADHD risk.
00:14:32
Speaker 1: That's got to be confusing, right, I mean Harvard, And that's the headline from Harvard.
00:14:37
Speaker 2: Yes, And Harvard goes on to say we recommend judicious aceta metaphine use, lowest effective dose, shortest duration under medical guidance tailored to individual risk benefit assessments rather than a broad limitation. Look, I don't know what the current guidelines are. I just know from when I was pregnant, and granted that it was I guess nineteen years ago was my last pregnancy, but I knew my doctors told me you aren't supposed to be taking anything unless you absolutely need to. It's just you don't get the liberal whatever you want to take to make yourself feel better in the moment, including a glass of wine, like.
00:15:12
Speaker 3: You know, it was the strictest of guidelines.
00:15:14
Speaker 2: And look, when you're growing this human inside of you, you recognize you have to do things differently and you have to be thinking of your child first. But so just seeing a headline like this, even if now other doctors refute it and say this is not likely, this is not do you actually think you're gonna feel totally okay popping a til and all Now that this is all being aired out out of an abundance of caution, I would say I probably would suffer through. And I had headaches and it was tough, it was hard. I had to actually I couldn't drink coffee, so I had to go through caffeine withdrawal and I had to deal with the headaches.
00:15:48
Speaker 3: So even if I thought about.
00:15:50
Speaker 2: Taking tile and all, because you're like, oh, you can take tilt all. I would probably not do it just in case.
00:15:55
Speaker 1: But to your point earlier as well, that we heard a doctor mentioned that comes with risks as well to telling women who are in pain not to take it.
00:16:02
Speaker 2: Now, I'm stressed, now, I'm angry, now, I'm frustrated. Now if any other thing happens on top of my pain, now, I'm not handling things well emotionally, and that does transfer to your child.
00:16:13
Speaker 1: Johns Hopkins, same thing, headline, taking thailand al during pregnancy associated with elevated risks for autism. Those are headlines for these big names. Now they go on to say the researcher points out that although the study found a consistent association between biomarkers of aceta metaphant and it's wh blah blah blah metapic in cord blood, it said it should not be interpreted that thailanol use causes these disorders. So the headline says one thing, thailand all during pregnancy associated with elevated risk. Then they go down and say it should not be interpreted that taileran all use causes these disorders. It's just confusing.
00:16:55
Speaker 2: It's incredibly, incredibly confusing, especially then when you look at the largest study out there, funded by the National Institutes of Health, A new study from JAMMA research shows no casual link between thailanol and autism. A new study from JAMMA found that using a set of menaphin, the active ingredient in thailenol, during pregnancy, was not associated with increased risk of autism, ADHD, or intellectual disability in children. So now you have a completely opposite headline by a incredibly well regarded organization and funded by the National Institutes of Health saying the exact opposite of what we just heard.
00:17:42
Speaker 1: Okay, I've been what are the words causation, correlation, association, all these things. Correlation versus causation. Correlation just means the two things are existing and they're in some way connected, but it doesn't mean that one causes the correlation versus causation. Causation directly means this thing causes that thing, correct, And that's the difference. I saw a great example, and I'm so sorry I can't give them credit for it. Between causation and correlation. It's silly, but it's simple. The sun hot day, the sun is beaming down on you, and you eating ice cream, the sun comes down on you and you get sunburn. The sun comes down, it melts the ice cream.
00:18:27
Speaker 3: That's causation.
00:18:27
Speaker 1: The sun directly calls the ice cream to melt, directly cause you to get sunburned. But just because your sunburn, that doesn't mean your ice cream is gonna melt. That's correlation. Wow, caud it was so interesting how they put that two things are related. They both exist under these same conditions. But the ice cream melting didn't cause your sunburn, and the sunburn didn't cause ice cream and melt. Even though they're correlated based on the environment, that actually.
00:18:56
Speaker 3: Is a helpful way to explain the difference.
00:18:58
Speaker 1: God, I want to give them credit. Whoever put that out, thank you. I'm sorry I cannot remember, but that's how they explained and that made perfect sense to me.
00:19:05
Speaker 3: That absolutely does.
00:19:06
Speaker 2: And yet still just this headline alone will instill fear in women who are pregnant period at the.
00:19:14
Speaker 1: Bot where's the entail and all put out a statement and they have a big thing on their website as well, trying to explain things.
00:19:21
Speaker 2: Yes, they write on their website, we understand the recent media coverage you're reading may cause concern or lead to questions. We want to make sure you have the answers. So they say this, here is what we can tell you. Credible independent scientific data continues to show no proven link between taking acid of metaphine and autism. Medical and public health organizations agree, and then they say this includes the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the Society for Maternal Fetal Medicine, Autism Science Foundation, and the US Food and Drug Administration, which that may change given this new headline and these new recommendations that we make be getting from RFK Junior, who is in charge of AHHS, and certainly the FDA is under that umbrella. So for now that holds true. But there and I appreciate this. They say, our best advice talk to your healthcare professional before taking or administering acet of metaphine period.
00:20:20
Speaker 4: And that makes sense. I mean, that's and it should be on.
00:20:22
Speaker 3: A case by case basis. It should be sure.
00:20:25
Speaker 2: I think it's fair to say you should limit the time on all you're taking or anything you're taking, and you have to be careful about what you eat and what you drink and how much you exercise.
00:20:34
Speaker 3: In all of that. When you're pregnant.
00:20:36
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, other to your point about other factors, people overweight, folks have different factors that factor into some of this. They were saying age could factor into some of this.
00:20:47
Speaker 3: That's huge.
00:20:48
Speaker 2: I you know, it's one of those when you're pregnant over the age of thirty five, you're considered a geriatric pregnant woman, which seems silly, but it's true in terms of the viability and just the overall health of your eggs. And they say once you go over that age, every year your risk of a lot of things increases, including autism, and so age is a huge factor.
00:21:10
Speaker 1: Well, folks, we are keeping an eye on this one today. Just wanted to preview and let you know what's out there before you as you get prepared to hear what's coming. And we will be watching and we will certainly update you again again. Top right corner of your Apple podcast app on our show page, a little button says follow Just click that you can get our updates coming right to you. And there have been a lot of them that we'll check in with you again, but for now I'm TJ's home, so on behalf of my No you want to jump again, what you say your name.
00:21:36
Speaker 2: Oh no, no, no, I thought maybe you kind of messed up your name, so I was I was laughing at you. I thought you kind of slurred your TJ home, so I was just laughing at you.
00:21:43
Speaker 3: I didn't want to jump in.
00:21:44
Speaker 1: I'm trying to recover that. It's just been a rough weekend. You weren't here and I was a mess.
00:21:48
Speaker 4: All right, so on behalf of TJ Holmes.
00:21:51
Speaker 3: I'm Amy Roboch. We will talk to you again soon