Former U.S. Surgeon General on President Trump’s pick for leading the CDC and Tylenol

(CBS, KYMA) - Dr. Jerome Adams, former U.S. Surgeon General, spoke with Margaret Brennan on Face the Nation Sunday about President Donald Trump's pick to lead the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

According to Brennan, the U.S. has been without a Senate-confirmed CDC director after HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fired Dr. Susan Monarez a month into her term.

However, this past week, President Donald Trump named Dr. Erica Schwartz, who was Dr. Adams' Deputy Surgeon General, to lead the CDC, prompting Brennan to ask Adams if he sees this as a deliberate choice by the White House to pick someone who actually supports vaccines, to which he said:

"Absolutely. And again, we've talked in the past about the fact that the Fabrizio and Ward poll showed that Republicans were going to pay in the midterm elections if they continued on an anti-vaccine push. But I want to say Dr. Schwartz is a home run pick. She has an MD, a JD and an MPH and more than two decades of public service in the Coast Guard, where she was chief medical officer and in the Public Health Service, as you mentioned, which she retired from as a Rear Admiral, and it's why I personally selected her to be my deputy surgeon general."

Brennan followed by asking Adams if he has any concerns that Dr. Schwartz will be able to conduct herself without political interference, and Adams said:

"It's a great, and it's a fair question...I'd say she is objectively the most qualified health nominee we've seen from this administration so far, and I want to give the President and senior HHS adviser Chris Klomp credit for tapping her, but that said, my optimism as yours comes with a healthy dose of caution about the environment around Dr. Schwartz. We've seen this before, as you mentioned with Susan Monarez, and just last week, the acting CDC director held back an MMWR report showing COVID vaccines reduced ER visits in healthy adults this winter. Further, Dr. Schwartz still has to get through Senate confirmation, where she will clearly be pitted against RFK on vaccines. And recent history tells us, if she's confirmed, she will be under real threat to follow ideology over evidence in what is a vaccine skeptical HHS, while also confronting a growing measles outbreak, low CDC morale and ongoing DOGE cut impacts."

During the interview, Brennan and Adams talked about Secretary Kennedy's being asked about past statements both he and the president made about linking Tylenol use in pregnant women to autism in their children, with Rep. Blake Moore (R-Utah), whose son is neurodivergent, saying Kennedy's remarks were hurtful.

"I was underwhelmed with what we ultimately put out. My wife was hurt, and she felt for a split second until she came to her senses and we talked about this, that there was any way she was responsible. We don't even know if she took Tylenol during her pregnancy, but that was a hurtful moment for her," Rep. Moore expressed.

However, Kennedy said the studies showing there is no linkage between Tylenol and autism are "garbage," leading Brennan to ask Adams what the reality is, and he said:

"The reality is that for pregnant women dealing with fever or significant pain, Tylenol remains one of the safest and most studied options we have. And suggesting otherwise without evidence, is dangerous. It's irresponsible, and as you heard the Congressman say, it is extremely stigmatizing towards parents and risks real harm to moms and babies. The science moves forward with data, not with dogma and with dismissal and the garbage he was referring to was a Danish study of 1.5 million children that came out, and it presents queer- clear, high quality evidence that pregnant women who use Tylenol do not have an increased risk of autism. In fact, in that study, they had a lower risk of autism."

To watch more of Brennan's interview with Adams, click here.