Nigel Farage has compared paracetamol to thalidomide—one of the worst drug scandals in modern history—after refusing to call Donald Trump irresponsible for suggesting the painkiller may cause autism.
Speaking to presenter Nick Ferrari on LBC this morning, the Reform UK leader said he had ‘no idea’ if the claim was correct, adding: ‘We were told thalidomide was a very safe drug and it wasn’t.’
Thalidomide was sold in the late 1950s as a safe, non-addictive remedy for morning sickness and other ailments, and was widely prescribed to pregnant women without proper testing.
Within a few years it caused one of the worst drug disasters in history, killing and injuring up to 100,000 babies worldwide and leaving thousands more with severe birth defects, before it was withdrawn in 1961.
Mr Trump earlier this week caused shockwaves when he claimed government health warnings would soon be printed on paracetamol packets—often sold under the brand name Tylenol in the US—advising pregnant women to avoid the drug because of a supposed link to autism.
His remarks sparked outrage among medical experts, who dismissed them as fear-mongering with ‘no robust evidence’ to support the claim.
Britain’s regulator, the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), also stressed there is ‘no evidence that taking paracetamol during pregnancy causes autism in children.’
Mr Farrage was asked whether President Trump was correct to make the claim. Mr Farage responded: ‘I have no idea, I have no idea.
‘We were told thalidomide was a very safe drug and it wasn’t. Who knows. I don’t know and you don’t know.
‘He [Mr Trump] has a particular thing about autism, I think because there has been some in his family and he feels it very personally. I have no idea.’
Asked if he would side with medical experts who say it is dangerous to make the link, Mr Farage added: ‘I wouldn’t, when it comes to science, I don’t side with anybody.
‘I don’t side with anybody because science is never settled, and we should remember that.
‘That’s an opinion [Mr Trump has] got. It’s not one that I necessarily share. But I mean, honestly, I’ve no idea.’
Paracetamol is widely used by pregnant women to treat pain, headaches and fever, and remains the NHS’s recommended ‘first choice’ painkiller during pregnancy, but only for short periods and at the lowest effective dose.
In an announcement on Monday, Mr Trump told reporters that taking paracetamol was simply ‘not good’, declaring: ‘All pregnant women should talk to their doctors about limiting the use of this medication while pregnant.’
He later doubled down: ‘Fight like hell not to take it.’
A handful of well-publicised studies have suggested a possible link between maternal use of paracetamol and higher rates of autism or ADHD.
But the findings are inconsistent, and experts stress that any association remains based on very limited and conflicting evidence.
The most recent, published last month by researchers at Mount Sinai in New York and Harvard’s School of Public Health, urged women to take paracetamol in pregnancy only on the advice of a doctor—though the authors acknowledged the evidence was not conclusive.
They urged mothers-to-be to use paracetamol sparingly, taking only the lowest effective dose for the shortest possible time.
But they stressed their results did not prove the drug directly causes autism or other neurodevelopmental disorders.
Instead, they said the association was consistent enough to warrant further investigation.
Scientists on both sides of the Atlantic reacted with scepticism—a some criticised the claims as stigmatising parents of children with autism.
Health Secretary Wes Streeting also dismissed the remarks.
‘Don’t pay any attention whatsoever to what Donald Trump says about medicine,’ he said.
‘In fact, don’t even take my word for it as a politician—listen to British doctors, British scientists, the NHS. It’s really important, at a time when there is scepticism, to follow medical science.’
Thalidomide was hailed as a ‘wonder drug’ for morning sickness when it was created by German pharmaceutical giant Gruenenthal Group in the 1950s.
But it was soon pulled after a doctor in Australia reported a link between the drug and birth defects, such as malformed hands, facial disfigurement and brain damage.
Charities blame the drug for the deaths of up to 100,000 babies worldwide, and say it left 10,000 severely disabled—such as with missing or deformed limbs.
Experiments later revealed that it triggered birth defects by stopping blood vessels forming in babies.
Yet, despite being pulled for morning sickness in 1961, thalidomide is still used to this day.
There are, however, strict rules on women of child-bearing age using the drug.
It is given to patients with myeloma, a type of cancer that starts in the bone marrow, and for the treatment of Hansen’s disease—also known as leprosy—which is an infection caused by slow-growing bacteria.
