If this goes to court won't that just prove that there's no credible link between the 2? So what's Paxton's game here? Does he really think Tylenol causes autism or is this about forcing J&J to say that it does despite facts?
He’s running for the U.S. Senate [1] and pandering to idiots.
[1] https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/5575242-rove-cautions-...
I'm honestly not even sure he is running for Senate. He might just be going turbo MAGA in hopes that Trump tries to buy him out of dropping out with an administration appointment, the way they did with Adams in NYC [1] (until he bombed out in the polls).
The Republican party has developed a perverse incentive structure where running in the primary as an unelectable nutjob in order to get bribed to drop out is a precedented strategy [2].
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/05/nyregion/eric-adams-saudi...
[2] https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/arizona-gop-boss-quits...
One of the things about a jury trial is that the science itself is never on trial, and there's always a risk that one side can just out-maneuver the other.
I’m sure the inevitable retraction of autism links will get the proper coverage it deserves.
There is an established statistically measurable link between some viral infections during pregnancy and autism. So there is a statistically measurable link between Tylenol use (which reduce fever and pain) with the person having fever and pain.
If there is published science claiming so, they have to now argue for why this science is misleading or wrong instead of simply dismissing the case for having no scientific ground. The science is lazy but not outright wrong, and has not been retracted.
The tragic part is that it's far worse for the baby for a the mother to have a high unchecked fever or infection, or to use any other painkiller (most of which are well known to be dangerous during pregnancy). So even if there is a remnant risk after taking relevant variables into account, it is a far preferable risk to continue to use it.
You can't claim that "science says there's a measurable link" when the science in question says the link is just a correlation based on Tylenol being used to treat the causal link (fever from viral infection). Science isn't about finding correlation. It's about identifying causal links. That's why we do experiments.
Science is fundamentally about finding correlations. We measure things we think are interesting to measure, and try to see if it matches our models and theories. The study found a correlation in their data, and that correlation is real. If that is where that study ends then it's still a valid study. Other papers could apply some more complex statistics to make a guess at the cause, or an aggregate study can take data from a collection of previous studies to re-process the data for new insights.
The "scientific consensus" ends up being what the largest samples studies with good statistical rigor seem to agree on. But that always ends up murky to use in court. "Published paper says X" is usually where most popular science ends, and in this case they're right. "Scientific consensus" is pretty clear that the cause is likely viral infection during pregnancy, but scientific consensus isn't written down anywhere as scientific consensus.
We've been fighting for 30 years about MMR and autism, which was a single retracted study discredited by every study since. And how we're gonna somehow discuss in courts about the correct statistical model to explain a real correlation.
Yeah, we mostly agree. Sorry if I was a bit harsh. I have been very frustrated about the MAHA push away from science based medicine and into lawyer based medicine.
Your point about it being difficult to defend and easy to apply manipulative rhetoric around statistical integrity and methods is a good one.