The Case for Reforming Drug Naming: Should Brand Name Trademark Protections Expire upon Generic Entry?

• Innovator drugs are given their own brand name and a common generic name that is shared with products certified as bioequivalent by a regulatory authority. • Characteristics—including names—that uniquely identify a seller’s product are entitled to legal protection against misappropriation. • Well-controlled studies and decades of use reveal that generic drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration and European Medicines Agency are interchangeable with their innovator counterparts. • Widespread use of brand names persists within health care systems even after market exclusivity ends on those products, resulting in wasteful expenditures on products for which substantially cheaper, generic equivalents are available. • Allowing generic products to share the brand names of their corresponding innovator products could help reduce health care spending but would not prevent manufacturers from promoting their products or physicians from ensuring manufacturer-specific dispensing.