In a move that may clear the way for the first new treatment in years for depression, an expert panel recommended on Tuesday that federal regulators approve a nasal spray that delivers the active ingredients of ketamine, a popular club drug in the 1980s and 1990s.

The new drug, called Esketamine and developed by Johnson & Johnson, is aimed at people with severe depression, particularly those with suicidal thinking. The panel, with 17 voting members, including psychiatrists and consumer representatives, was nearly unanimous in deciding that the drug’s benefits outweighed its risks. The Food and Drug Administration typically follows the recommendations of its expert panels.

In recent years, scores of clinics have opened around the country, offering to administer intravenous ketamine for depression, on a schedule similar to that of electroshock therapy: as a series of treatments, over a period of days or weeks, and sometimes including follow-up or “booster” visits months later. These treatments, at an average cost of $3,000, are officially “off-label,” and usually are not covered by insurance. Their effectiveness is not well studied, although people who have received the course of treatment have reported rapid, if not always lasting, relief.

If approved, Esketamine would be covered by most insurers.

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