Last week, President Trump warned that women who take Tylenol during pregnancy risk giving their child autism. The announcement, made during a press conference with other top administration health officials, was met with an outcry from medical professionals who said there is no scientific link between Tylenol use during pregnancy and autism. Our analysts examined media coverage of the debate in our Topic of the Week.

The most fact-based and balanced coverage from our content set came from a video by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. In the video on the CBC News YouTube channel, host Andrew Chang dissects Trump’s comments and the studies cited by the administration. He explains the difference between “association” or “causal” vs. “correlation” when looking at medical research. He also reports on Trump’s proclamation that there is “no downside” to avoiding Tylenol during pregnancy, noting that one must weigh the benefits and the risks. 

An article from Politifact, a fact-checking website, looks in depth at many statements Trump made during the press conference: that some groups, like the Amish, don’t vaccinate their kids nor take ”any pills,” and they have no cases of autism; that autism rates are up by more than 400% since 2000; that babies don’t need the Hepatitis B vaccine because the disease is sexually transmitted; and more. The article provides links to research and information about each claim.

Our analysts found both the video and the article to be a “mix of fact reporting and analysis” with a “balanced” bias.

Articles from Boing Boing and Natural News were both found to be “selective or incomplete.” Natural News looks at reports of “some Democrats” and pregnant women “chugging Tylenol” in protest of Trump’s statements. “Trump Derangement Syndrome in FULL EFFECT as lunatic Libtards who are pregnant are now taking Tylenol by the handful,” the headline says. The article summarizes various medical studies, calling the link between Tylenol and autism “unsettled science.” Analysts noted instances of name calling, such as “Liberal lunatics” and”‘Demonic Democrats,” and rated the article with a “hyper-partisan right” bias.

Boing Boing, however, describes the press conference like this: “… a barely coherent Donald Trump tried to pronounce acetaminophen and demonstrated his administration’s groundbreaking work on autism is a farce.” The article speculates that Trump made the announcement to “push some BS herbal thing, Dr. Oz is selling, or is just another way the Christian Nationalist right can scapegoat women.” Again, our team found that the article contains a number of insults, such as calling Trump a “babbling moron” with “a lack of mental acuity,” and the article’s photo of Trump and Jeffrey Epstein is “irrelevant,” according to our analysts. The article received a bias rating of “hyper-partisan left.”

A video from the Jack Cocchiarella YouTube channel was found to be “misleading” with a “hyper-partisan left” bias. The video’s headline proclaims that “COLLAPSING Trump UNABLE To SPEAK As Handlers RUSH TO SAVE HIM!,” which our analysts found to be misleading. The host calls Trump “the stupidest person in America” … “whose brain is leaking out of his ears.” And that’s just in the first 10 seconds of the video. He uses profanity and insults both Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. throughout, calling them “two guys responsible for the loss of children’s lives, not only right now because of measles, but for generations to come with the way that they have muddied the waters.”

Liberty Nation News provided the lowest-rated reporting from our content set this week. Its article supports the statements made by Trump and blames “leftist media” for questioning the research. Analysts found that the article states as fact some of the claims made by Trump, although other sources have found them to be false. The article describes Trump as showing “emotional concern for suffering children and their parents,” while “Efforts by the leftist press to pour cold water on this latest research are spiteful and show no compassion for these families.” The article was found to “contain inaccurate info” and to have a “hyper-partisan right” bias.

Want to see if you agree with our analysts? New Topics of the Week are posted on the website each Monday. Analyst scores are published on Wednesday. Learn more here.