Prescription drug advertising can be downright comical. Between middle-aged men petting dogs on the banks of rivers in cholesterol drug ads, and narrators rattling off a litany of potential side effects in seemingly every ad, I sometimes wonder how people can take them seriously. But such commercials keep airing because they work. Millions of consumers are asking their health care providers for the promoted brand-name drugs — even when less expensive, identical generics are available.
These drugs, authorized generics, are brand-name drugs in disguise. They are identical in composition to brand-name drugs, and they differ from other generics because they’re frequently made by the brand drug manufacturer and contain the same inactive ingredients as the brand drug. (Other generics have the same active ingredients, but not always the same inactive ones.)
Instead of demanding a brand drug, consider taking authorized generics whenever possible. They will save you money on medications without sacrificing any quality; they have helped spare Americans billions of dollars on drug costs already.
Authorized generics have been around for a generation. They emerged after Congress passed the Hatch-Waxman Act in 1984, allowing drug companies to manufacture and sell generic versions of brand drugs — including their own — once patents on the brand drugs expired.
[See: How to Help Aging Parents Manage Medications.]
Like all generics, authorized generics must pass Food and Drug Administration inspection to ensure they are therapeutically equivalent to the brand drugs. They must pass the same safety and effectiveness standards, and have the same intended use as the original drugs.
Also like all generics, the authorized versions have helped curtail drug costs. Generics overall saved American health care $1.68 trillion between 2005 to 2014, including $254 billion in 2014 alone. That year, generics constituted 88 percent of all prescriptions written in the U.S., but only 28 percent of drug costs. Brand drugs, on the other hand, accounted for only 12 percent of the prescriptions but 72 percent of costs.
Although most patients, and even some doctors, are unaware of them, authorized generics have steadily increased in popularity. By 2014, more than one-third of brand drugs had a matching authorized generic.
Nevertheless, many consumers continue asking for the increasingly expensive brand drugs despite their price; they are unaware that an identical, less expensive medication is available. That demand is one reason Americans spend as much as two to five times times more for brand-name drugs than what people pay elsewhere for the same medication. These costs justify why, unlike the U.S., every other country in the world except New Zealand has banned advertising of prescription drugs on television.
[See: Behind the Window: What Pharmacists Do.]
To ensure you don’t fall into the brand-drug trap, you can ask your doctor if a generic is available whenever you are prescribed medication. If one is, ask your pharmacist for the authorized version. (The FDA lists available authorized generics here.) If it is not available, you can still take an ordinary generic.
Most experts agree brand drugs should only be used when no generics are available, much like other products whose branding does not impact its function nor concern most consumers. Would you spend $30 on a pair of undergarments when the same pair, down to the stitching and fabric content, is available for $10 simply because it lacks the familiar brand name on the package?
It’s up to you to be a savvy consumer, so you should also understand why companies make authorized generics. As a leading clinical psychiatry professor wrote recently in the New York Times, “The goal of drug companies is not to educate, but to sell products.” They produce authorized generics to vie with generics produced by competitors, often continuing to produce and aggressively market their more expensive brand drugs. Many companies earn enormous profits in part by leveraging advertising and exploiting legal loopholes to keep their brand drugs on the market for as long as possible. Some manufacturers even arrange with rivals to keep generics off the market for a few months after patents expire. In turn, they promise to then delay releasing their authorized generic, to lessen competition for the rival’s generic version.
[See: What Your Doctors Wish You Knew.]
While the Federal Trade Commission and policymakers examine whether to close those loopholes, don’t be misled by the drug ads that saturate your media. Generics including authorized versions are out there and they can help you — whether you are a middle-aged man with high cholesterol, a 30-something woman with insomnia or a child with an attention disorder.
Drug ads can be funny, but wasting your health care dollars is not.
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The Value of Authorized Generics originally appeared on usnews.com
