Bristol Myers Squibb and Pfizer are back with a familiar message: There's "No Time to Wait." This time, the partners have brought basketball Hall of Famer Kareem Abdul-Jabbar on board for their perennial push to persuade people not to sleep on atrial fibrillation symptoms.
In 2020, BMS and Pfizer, fearing a dent in demand for their blockbuster blood thinner Eliquis, responded to the pandemic-driven slump in primary care appointments with bid to boost awareness of the symptoms of afib, deep vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism. The core message? When you have symptoms, there's no time to wait, so get checked out. Last year, the partners re-upped the campaign with a fresh TV ad.
BMS and Pfizer put doctors and normal patients at the heart of the first two ad campaigns. The 2023 edition delivers the same message in a different way, with Abdul-Jabbar’s description of his own experience of developing afib symptoms dominating the two-minute spot.
Abdul-Jabbar describes his “first inkling” that something was wrong, revealing that he got out of breath more easily “but didn’t think that it was anything serious.” That changed when he needed to sit down every 20 to 30 yards when walking through an airport, but the 75-year-old former basketball star still held off on visiting his physician.
“Every physical exertion seemed to exhaust me. I knew something was wrong. Then I went to a baseball game with some friends and I couldn't deal with any exertion. And finally I went from the baseball game to the hospital where I was diagnosed with afib,” Abdul-Jabbar says. “When I first noticed symptoms, I should have gone to the doctor and told them what was happening. Instead, I tried to let it pass.”
Abdul-Jabbar wants other people to learn from his mistake. Noting that afib increases the risk of stroke by about five times, the Hall of Famer lists symptoms such as irregular heartbeat that should prompt people to talk to their doctors, before signing off by saying “when it comes to your health, this is no time to wait.”
With BMS and Pfizer backing the drug with ad dollars, sales of Eliquis continued to grow through the pandemic. Last year, BMS reported (PDF) sales of $11.8 billion, with a 21% jump in U.S. revenues driving growth, and Pfizer included $6.5 billion in Eliquis alliance revenues and direct sales in its report.