Bernie Williams, baseball legend and Latin Grammy-nominated musician, is using his considerable star power to draw attention to and reduce stigma about a cause close to his heart.
Williams has joined with liver cancer advocacy group Blue Faery, the Global Liver Institute and liver cancer drugmaker Eisai in launching launch the “One Liver to Love” initiative.
The subject is a personal one for Williams as his mother, uncle and grandfather have all been impacted by liver disease. He also talks about how his community is affected as liver problems show up in underserved communities and often communities of color.
“I have relatives and people who are really dear to my heart who have struggled with liver disease,” Williams said. “That’s basically what got me involved, knowing their struggles, and maybe I can lend a little bit of my personal story to raise awareness so people could listen to it and maybe be a little bit more proactive about their liver health,” he said in an interview.
The campaign video features the former Yankee on his old stomping grounds of a baseball diamond, which serves as a metaphor for the four basics of liver heath: nutrition, exercise, sleep and mental health.
While the cornerstone of the project focuses on starting and maintaining a healthy lifestyle, it is by no means meant to infer that lack of these tenants are the cause of liver disease or cancer. And liver cancer is a complex illness, often thought of as “a disease within a disease," as many people afflicted with liver cancer may also have other liver-related conditions such as chronic liver disease, viral hepatitis (B or C), fatty liver disease or cirrhosis.
In many cases, there is stigma associated with liver problems, but it’s not that simple. Mark Lewis, M.D., a medical oncologist and director of gastrointestinal oncology at Intermountain Healthcare who is also part of the project, explained blaming liver problems on lifestyle this way: “It's a false sense of understanding of the complexity of the biology. The formula I like to cite is that all cancer is the sum of our heredity or genetics, our lifestyle, our environmental exposures and chance, and because that last variable is basically bad luck. It's really hard to point at someone's past choices and say with 100% certainty that’s what gave them cancer.”
In addition to the website, Williams and Lewis are doing interviews, and people can follow along with the hashtag #OneLiverToLove on social media. Williams is promoting on his own channels as well and hopes he can bring some clarity and improve education and understand of this complex disease.
“I have some sort of a following coming down from baseball, in my sports experience, and also most recently, my music experience—being able to perform in different places, and having the opportunity to tie those things together, gives me a broader audience that I can target to talk about these issues that I consider as important as my other endeavors.”