What are the medical guidelines for pregnant women?
Acetaminophen/paracetamol is the recommended first-line medication for pain and fever during pregnancy in guidelines from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), Britain’s Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and other medical organisations.
Use of ibuprofen, naproxen and other nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs in the third trimester can lead to birth defects, both societies warn.
Pregnant women should talk to their doctor if they plan to take any of these medications, ACOG advises.
Dr Steven Fleischman, president of the ACOG, expressed concern that Trump’s claims would terrify mothers-to-be and parents with children with autism.
“I don’t want you going back and looking and saying to yourself, ‘I shouldn’t have done this, I shouldn’t have done that.’ It’s nothing you did. It really is not,” he said.
“Not treating the fever probably has more adverse effects that you need to worry about than taking the medication.”
What are the risks of not reducing fever during pregnancy?
Trump said on Monday that pregnant people should “tough it out”, and that only an “extremely high fever” would justify taking the over-the-counter medicine.
However, untreated maternal fever and pain during fetal development can increase the risks of birth defects such as heart conditions, abdominal wall defects and neural tube defects in which the brain and spinal cord do not form properly.
Untreated pain and fever have also been linked with preterm birth, low birth weight and miscarriage. They can also result in high blood pressure, dehydration, depression and anxiety, as well as other health problems, in pregnant women.
Arthur Caplan, the head of New York University’s medical ethics division, called Trump’s display “dangerous,” “unscientific” and “full of misinformation”.
“I worry that pregnant women are going to feel guilty if they took Tylenol. They’re going to feel they let down their babies,” Caplan told AFP.
“They’re going to feel that they were unethical in terms of trying to treat fever. That’s just not fair, and it’s not anything that anybody should be feeling.”
