Eli5: what is the difference between a generic drug to the original drug, and why do some doctors will swear by the original drug?

Question

Eli5: what is the difference between a generic drug to the original drug, and why do some doctors will swear by the original drug?

In: 1046

Answer 1

Hi, I work in European intellectual property. There’s some great points being discussed but also there’s a key IP point no one seems to have mentioned yet – patent thickets.

Basically, when a drug company finds a new drug, they patent it – gaining the rights to stop others from using that drug for a fixed period of time. When that runs out, other companies can sell generics with the “same” active ingredient.

HOWEVER, the drug company didn’t sit on their pile of money, forming wads of notes into a comfy sofa, they found other little inventions around the drug:
– the best way to put the pill together for the best release profile,
– the best way to crystallise the drug to have the best response profile,
– the best dosage regimen to treat the disease,
– the best way to make the drug itself

All of these inventions can be patented, forming a thicket of rights around the drug. And because these are discovered later than the drug itself, the monopoly from those patents runs out later (this is called “evergreening”).

So, the generic companies may be able to sell pills with the “same” active ingredient, but they may not (yet) be able to sell pills with the optimum results, so they may have to tweak other things to provide the same dose-response to be allowed to sell them, which can cause toxicity issues etc.