ICER chas­tis­es J&J for over­pric­ing de­pres­sion drug es­ke­t­a­mine ‘where there is such need for treat­ment’

Cog­nizant of the myr­i­ad of ap­proved an­ti­de­pres­sants that of­ten don’t work, reg­u­la­tors en­dorsed J&J’s $JNJ phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal ver­sion of the hal­lu­cino­genic anes­thet­ic ke­t­a­mine — es­ke­t­a­mine — in March for treat­ment-re­sis­tant de­pres­sion, well aware that the orig­i­nal cat tran­quil­iz­er is fre­quent­ly used off-la­bel for se­vere de­pres­sion. On Thurs­day, ICER con­clud­ed that while the drug, sold as Spra­va­to, does con­fer a “promis­ing” clin­i­cal ben­e­fit, its cur­rent list price ex­ceeds a com­mon cost-ef­fec­tive­ness thresh­old by a mod­est mar­gin.

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