They’re all called things like Zyrtec or Imbruvica. What is the convention that’s used to create these names, and why can’t they just be called something normal, like … I dunno, ‘Headache-Be-Gone’ ?
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Each drug has several names.
The chemical name is often very long and difficult to remember, but it describes precisely the structure of the chemical.
The generic name has a part that’s unique plus an ending that government drug approvers use to tell the type of drug. For example, if it ends in “-mab” it is a monoclonal antibody. The unique part can be anything, but it’s typically either based on Latin or Greek words describing what it does (more common in older drugs), the disease it works on, or something about the drug’s target — but it could be anything.
Then, a drug maker also gives their own version of the drug a brand name. These names are sometimes selected by naming contests in the company (seriously), or in consultation with a company that makes up names and logos. The names have to be unique and not already in use, they should be pretty different than other existing drugs names, ideally they be short and easy to remember, and importantly they can’t be a real word in any country where the drug be sold (they can’t sound like a dirty word or swear word in the countries either).
I work for a drug company, and our drug brand names are based on naming contests. They all contain hidden in the name a reference to the gene or protein they affect. The gene and protein names were proposed by the first people to describe them and standardized by international committees that exist to make sure scientists consistently use the same name for a thing — before those committees existed there might have been a dozen different names for a given gene or protein.
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