What's missing from the headlines about Tylenol, Trump, and autism

This week, comments from Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and President Trump made headlines, after they cautioned against pregnant women's use of Tylenol (acetaminophen) due to research they say shows a possible increased risk of autism for their babies.

But none of these headlines discussed what's most important to remember in all of this: every child is worthy of life and love, regardless of any condition or disability they may have.

Key Takeaways:

• There has been much discussion about preventing autism and other disabilities, but little towards providing proper support and resources for people who live with them or for their families.

• A disturbing mindset exists globally that regards people with disabilities as if they should not exist. Preborn children with Down syndrome and other diagnosed disabilities are routinely aborted, individuals with disabilities are discriminated against in healthcare, and the world generally regards people with disabilities as "better off dead."

• Whether a person has autism, Down syndrome, dementia, cystic fibrosis, anencephaly, or any other condition, that person has the right to life as well as inherent value and dignity as a human being.

• Every human being should be supported and cherished — in every circumstance.

The Details:

Regardless of their condition, it is a tragedy that people with disabilities are commonly marked for death, or treated as less human than their neurotypical and able-bodied peers. Those targeted deaths can occur in a number of ways: abortion, so-called "mercy killing," assisted suicide, euthanasia — and even indirectly, through the denial of basic health care.

Down syndrome

People with Down syndrome are frequent targets for eugenic abortion. Because of the increase in prenatal testing, more parents are learning that their children have Down syndrome during pregnancy; unfortunately, this discovery is rarely used as a way to offer those families and their children support. Instead, the majority of the time, these preborn children become instant targets for abortion.

And rather than see this search-and-destroy mentality as a tragedy, much of the world believes killing these children is the best and most 'moral' course of action. As Live Action News has previously reported (emphases added):

Iceland has a 100% abortion rate for preborn babies diagnosed with Down syndrome. In Poland, before laws were instituted protecting them, nearly every preborn baby aborted there was killed due to disability. Just 18 babies with Down syndrome were born in Denmark in 2019, while the Netherlands was caught telling women they have a “moral duty” to abort if their children have Down syndrome.

In countries like New Zealand, people with Down syndrome are denied residency requests due to their disability, and there has been a massive increase in eugenic abortions. In the United Kingdom (UK), it’s been estimated that 91% of babies with Down syndrome are aborted after a diagnosis, and the UK’s Antenatal Results and Choices will only give parents resources and support if they choose to have an abortion after a prenatal diagnosis. Australian media gushed over prenatal testing that they said could “effectively end” Down syndrome; in truth, it will identify and execute children with the condition before birth.

In at least one survey, doctors admitted to giving parents of children with Down syndrome outdated, inaccurate information in an effort to scare them into abortion.

The Pro-Life Reply to: "Babies with Disabilities Are Better Off Aborted"

'Don't screen us out'

Prenatal testing is, in actuality, a pro-life tool that should be used to help parents plan and prepare for their child's disability. Instead, it has been hijacked and turned into a means of screening out so-called “defective” children and aborting them.

And though people with identifiable disabilities like Down syndrome or spina bifida are typically the targets, autistic people have reported their fears of being treated the same way: discriminated against and killed through eugenic abortions before they’re even born.

As research has made it increasingly likely that this kind of prenatal identification can happen, autistic self-advocates have spoken against it.

Autistic author and journalist Laura James said:

“If you want to improve the lives of any group of people… the best way of going about that is asking them what would improve their quality of life, not asking for their DNA and not explaining what’s going to happen to it.

If somebody develops antenatal screening [for autism], for example, as they have with Down’s syndrome, then we could be in a situation like in Iceland, where barely anybody’s been born with Down’s [syndrome] for a number of years. Do we really want to write autistic people out of the world?”

Discriminatory denial

People with intellectual disabilities are often denied access to organ transplants, which can cause death — and has. Though legislation has been repeatedly introduced to bar this discrimination from happening, it routinely goes nowhere.

And in the meantime, doctors refuse organ transplants to people simply because of their disabilities — not because it is medically necessary to do so or because they are not good candidates.

Consider a 2016 letter to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights, which included a statement from Dr. Arthur Caplan, director of medical ethics for New York University’s Langone Medical Center. Caplan said (emphasis added), “If the potential [organ transplant] recipient is severely intellectually impaired… I do not think it makes sense to consider that child for a transplant.”

The parents of Zion Sarmiento, born with Down syndrome, were told that allowing their son a transplant would be a "waste of a heart." He died after multiple hospitals refused to approve him for a transplant.

Discriminatory death

Then there is the issue of assisted suicide. People with disabilities are often affected, particularly in countries like Canada and the Netherlands, where it is widely accepted.

People have received approval for 'assisted dying' for things like autism, mental illness, depression, quadriplegia, blindness, and even addiction. And as 'assisted dying' spreads, there are concerns that people with intellectual disabilities could be coerced into dying, whether they want to live or not.

This issue is so widespread that Catalina Devandas Aguilar, the United Nation’s first Rapporteur on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, issued a report which found that people with disabilities are being pressured into death or forced into nursing homes, while the court system refuses to reinforce their rights.

But, as disturbing as this all is, it only scratches the surface.

What's Happening: Deepened devaluing of the disabled

People with disabilities are routinely discussed as burdens on society, or as individuals who lack any "quality of life."

'Mercy' killings

Even murder has become acceptable... if the victim is a person with a disability.

Consider a parent who murders a disabled child; that parent often receives the proverbial slap on the wrist, because the world sees the parent's plight — raising a child with a disability or special needs — as a tragedy and a burden, so who could blame the parent for eventually turning to homicide?

The idea of "mercy killing" is something that even was favorably highlighted on the Dr. Phil Show, portrayed as if it's better to be dead than disabled.

In cases in which someone was previously able-bodied but became disabled with age, and that ailing spouse was murdered by the other spouse, media has portrayed this as romantic and noble — because who wouldn't want to die if they became disabled?

Wrongful birth/life lawsuits

Then there are the parents who, rather than murdering their children, insist they should never have been born.

These parents file wrongful birth lawsuits, telling the world their children's very existence is a mistake so egregious that they should be financially compensated for having to raise them.

DNRs and "slow code"

Yet, even when parents do want to raise their children with disabilities, they face a world that bombards them with messages that their children are better off dead.

Far too many doctors are willing to put do-not-resuscitate (DNR) orders in place for disabled children without parents' knowledge or consent, simply because those children have intellectual disabilities. Some also hasten the deaths of children with disabilities through a process known as "slow code."

Read more about DNRs and "slow code" at the links below:

• Study: COVID-19 patients with Down syndrome 6x more likely to be given DNRs

• SHOCK: ‘Do not resuscitate’ orders offered to teens with autism and learning disabilities

• Shock report: Doctors in the UK are giving DNRs for learning disabilities

• Report: Individuals with learning disabilities in UK given DNRs during pandemic

• Jury rules for hospital after woman with Down syndrome was allegedly left to die

• ‘Slow Code’: Outraged parents say doctors delay care for kids with disabilities

• Simon’s Law resuscitates parental rights for medically vulnerable children

'Better off dead than disabled'

In the United Kingdom, people with disabilities have been told they should have been aborted, and regularly face horrific bullying and abuse.

Around the world, it is normal for politicians, bioethicists, and countless others to call for “after-birth” abortions, forcible sterilization, and infanticide — but only for people with disabilities, of course. One Czech politician notoriously said parents should be able to euthanize their disabled children without the children's consent, because children with disabilities are "freaks" and "monsters."

That view is far too commonplace. The notion that it is better to be dead than disabled is seen in especially horrific detail with 'assisted dying.'

One woman, a wheelchair user, was protesting the ableist film “Me Before You,” and to illustrate her point, asked for people to donate for her own euthanasia. She received a large amount of donations. Reacting to this, she said:

“There were people who said if they were in a wheelchair, they would also want to die. And nobody said: ‘Why do you want to die?’ Nobody said: ‘Are you okay?’

It was such an awful moment for our group of people and it was the thing that solidified for me that we actually can’t safely put in place in this country assisted suicide legislation.”

In the media, able-bodied people find it acceptable to publicly talk about how horrible their disabled loved one's life is, and how that person would be better off dead. People with "bad genes" are heavily pressured not to reproduce.

The Bottom Line:

People with disabilities always have existed, and disability cannot always be prevented. Treating it as if it must be prevented at all costs, or that disabled person's life isn't worth living, is a serious blight on society.

While seeking optimal health is important, seeking to improve the lives of people with disabilities through better support and resources is far too often overlooked.

People with disabilities need their able-bodied peers to understand that they, too, have an inherent right to live, just like anyone else, and that they have intrinsic dignity and worth.