Merck & Co. is stepping up to the plate to raise awareness of the dangers of high LDL cholesterol and how it can increase the risk of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD).
Joining the New Jersey pharma in the lineup of the “Playing with Heart” campaign are WomenHeart, a nonprofit supporting women with or at risk for heart disease, and the St. Louis Cardinals.
The initiative’s metaphorical first pitch will, fittingly enough, be an actual first pitch: The campaign is set to kick off at the MLB team’s home game against the Milwaukee Brewers on Sept. 19, where Sierra Kile, daughter of late St. Louis player Darryl Kile—who died in 2002 at the age of 33 due to coronary artery disease, a type of ASCVD—and former Cardinal Adam Wainwright will throw out the game’s first ball.
Before the game, educational resource guides about ASCVD developed by Merck and WomenHeart will be distributed to fans. The guide will also be available online and will be used by WomenHeart’s network of educators across the U.S., according to Cristopher Regent, cardiovascular/metabolic leader of U.S. pharma at Merck.
Though Merck plans to eventually expand the campaign beyond St. Louis, it chose to start in the Missouri city for reasons both data-driven and more human, Regent said in an interview with Fierce Pharma Marketing.
For one, he referred to a 2021 report from the city’s health department showing a disproportionately high cardiovascular disease death rate in St. Louis and in Missouri as a whole. For another, he pointed to Kile’s tragic death during his time on the Cardinals roster, saying, “You look back to a city that’s been impacted by that loss, and so it was a great place for us to honor his legacy, to start this campaign, to educate and to raise awareness.”
The primary goal of the campaign is to boost the general public’s awareness of ASCVD and its risk factors, since it’s the leading cause of death in the U.S. and globally, but, per Regent, “many people, as you look across the U.S., are just simply not aware” of it.
ASCVD is caused by a buildup of plaque in the walls of the arteries that, if left untreated, can lead to dangerous blockages. High LDL cholesterol is a major risk factor for the disease, but “it’s symptomless—you don’t feel anything until you have that heart attack or stroke,” Regent noted.
“That’s why we’ve started this initiative,” he said. “We’re very proud about it, and it’s really to raise awareness, to educate and to encourage adults to know what their LDL number is and to talk to their doctor about it.”
He added, “Hopefully, we can make a difference here against the leading cause of death.”
Merck is still in the process of developing its broader patient outreach plan as it pertains to ASCVD, Regent said, but awareness-raising efforts like Playing with Heart are “a very key part of our plan.”
“Education is, I think, very important here, because we need to make people aware, we need to educate them, so that they can be empowered to go speak to their doctor or healthcare professional about this, and then they can guide them from there,” he said.
Merck has long sold treatments for high cholesterol and heart disease, anchored by its decades-old statin portfolio, plus more recent approvals for its Verquvo in chronic heart failure and Winrevair in pulmonary arterial hypertension. It’s now studying oral PCSK9 inhibitor MK-0616’s ability to lower LDL-C and reduce cardiovascular risk in a trio of studies and, earlier this year, inked a deal worth up to $2 billion to acquire ex-China rights to a phase 2-stage lipoprotein(a) inhibitor.
And Merck isn’t the only drugmaker to emphasize the risks of high LDL cholesterol as of late. Esperion Therapeutics anthropomorphized the so-called bad cholesterol as mischievous “Lipid Lurkers” in the first direct-to-consumer ads for its LDL cholesterol-lowering Nexletol and Nexlizet tablets, while Silence Therapeutics commissioned musical compositions to represent the symphony of risk factors that can lead to heart disease, with a specific focus on LDL variant lipoprotein(a).
Meanwhile, since 2023, Amgen has supported and started multiple educational campaigns about cholesterol health and set up a professional sports collab of its own, recruiting former NFL player Barry Sanders to star in a documentary film dubbed “The Making of a Heart Attack.”