Wham, Bam, Autism scams: Circumcisions and Autism
Bronwyn Rideout - 13th October 2025
RFK Jr. continues to find more and more reasons to blame acetaminophen for autism.
Telling pregnant people to suffer and/or die was universally panned, but to say there was an association between Tylenol and circumcision has caused confusion. On October 9th (US), RFK Jr. met with Trump and members of the Cabinet and said that infant boys who were circumcised had double the rate of Autism because of the Tylenol they were given afterwards. Granted, RFK Jr. did admit that “It is not proof. We’re doing the studies to make the proof”. Still, this belief in Autism being caused by medication taken by the child is more aligned with the research of William Parker, whom RFK Jr. was allegedly communicating with in the months leading up to the original September press conference.
During this meeting, an astounding lack of anatomy knowledge was demonstrated by the head of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, ranting about watching a TikTok of a pregnant woman taking paracetamol with “… a baby in her placenta”.
As a practising midwife, if I may…
Human babies normally grow in the uterus; implantation elsewhere is possible, but such scenarios are considered to be a serious medical complication called ectopic pregnancy. The placenta is an organ that is attached to the wall of the uterus, and is connected to the baby via the umbilical cord. The placenta is attached to the amniotic sac in which the fetus develops.
Is it sad that RFK Jr.’s lack of anatomy knowledge is the least of my worries with this administration?
It has been quickly deduced that the evidence of the connection between autism, circumcision, and acetaminophen is limited. Indeed, it appears that RFK Jr. has dumpster-dived into Google Scholar. First, there is a 2013 paper by Ann Bauer and David Kribel. The duo analysed international autism prevalence data, paracetamol usage rates, and data on early life exposure to paracetamol. The justification for circumcision as an event to analyse is that the authors saw it to be a common neonatal procedure in which paracetamol is prescribed. While it is practised globally, the prevalence of circumcision worldwide is estimated to be 38% - but varies by country. In the US, it is estimated to be 71-80%, in NZ about 33%, in Yemen 99%, and in Ireland 1%. The critiques of this study centred on the author’s oversight of the numerous factors within these countries that impact Autism, as well as the numerous childhood ailments in which children who are not circumcised might be given paracetamol as a neonate or young infant.
There is also a 2015 study by Frisch and Simonson that looked at a cohort of 342,877 Danish boys born between 1994 and 2003. Of the 4,986 cases of autism in the cohort, circumcised boys were more likely than intact boys to develop (or maybe more accurately, be diagnosed with) autism before the age of 10. Under the discussion of study weaknesses paracetamol is discussed, but the authors admit they did not collect information on procedural analgesics, and therefore they could not draw such conclusions. At the time this study was published, it was critiqued for its methodological flaws, including its sampling of boys who were circumcised in a hospital when the dominant cultural practice, especially for Muslims, is for it to happen at home.
The circumcision claims have not led to the same outrage as Trump’s condemnation of Tylenol intake during pregnancy, likely due to the global variance in the practice. Israeli and Jewish news outlets have accused RFK Jr. of antisemitism, but circumcision has non-religious applications as well. The World Health Organisation promotes it as part of its HIV prevention programmes, and it is used to treat various urogenital conditions. As organisations make sense of Thursday’s press conference, more criticism is likely to follow.
For me, I eagerly look forward to the next thing RFK Jr. finds on his witch hunt.