世上真有“聪明药”吗？

We want to take you into a kind of secret society, a hidden edge dicovered by some very successful Americans. We discovered sales of a little pill are not just booming. We have traced a 74% increaingly sales in 4 years. So, what is it? Does it work? And what is the risk? Here's ABC Stan Harris.

They're all around us. A secret society of the successful. The lobbyist, she wakes at 5 for two full workout before work.

"It's amazing, I just don't get why more people don't know about it."

The computer programmer who can now write code for 12 hours at a time. "It helps you focus up for exceptionally long period of time."

And a brain researcher finding connections nobody else is seeing. "It's just a clear day, the fog isn't there."

And they all say they owe it to this drug: provigil. It's only approved for narcolepse, sleepecnea or for people who work irregular hours. But many people are now taking it for an off-labor use to boost energy and focus. The drug, which excites the minds so much has been nicknamed "Viagra for the brain". It's quitely being used by military pilots, pro-athletes and pro-poker player. On the Internet, there're hundreds of sites evangelizing for provigil, explaining how to get your doctor to prescribe it to you, or how to get it without a prescription. In fact, there's literally one site called "buy provigil without prescribion.com".

Many provigil users are secretive, but not David Asprey, a successful executive who often wakes up at 4:50, pops a pill, makes breakfast for the kids. " Here you go". And also flies all over the world as VP of billion dollar Internet security firm.

"This can be the difference between, I'm just making it through the day to, I have like the best day in my life."

David says he went through 20 hours to Australia without almost no sleep, got off the plane, took a provigil, and delivered a series of speeches that were so good, they made the local paper.

As a kind of experiment, we asked David to stop taking the drug for 3 days and undergo cardiotest to measure his concentraton, and reaction time. During this whole 72 hour period, he said he just felt off.

"I've noticed that my speech is very bad altered." After 3 days, I watched that he poped a provigil. "All right, so I guess, let's do it. Let's see."

It took only 17 minutes for him to snap back, the world suddenly seem to be brighter, he said. David compared it into scene in the Wizard of OZ where goes from black and white to colour.

And remember those cogitive tests, even we could see it on this screen a pronounced improvement over the day before which of course raises this question. Should we all be on provigil? We called doctors all over the country to ask them if there's a downside. They told us there're rare cases of people developing a life-threatening rash. But the truth is most people don't suffer any side effects.

"Give me five."

There is however, one big fear, and it's what we don't know. There have been no studies on the long-term effects of provigil. If you need more energy, doctors say you're best bet is to get more sleep.

So, why put yourself under risk when you could simply get more sleep, engage habits that are conducive for good sleep.

But our provigil users say they're gonna keep on doing it. Most of them in secret, raising a provocative question in a morden world where you don't know who are around you is geting ahead simply by poping a pill. How far are you willing to go.

Again we've seen this incredible jump in the sales of this drug, just over past 4 years. And now the drug has gone generic which means doctors say most likely we're gonna see more people buying it.

Uh, does that make you more tempted having done this story?

Well, look, I have done this story now for the past couple of months, and 100% yes, I was tempted, but here's why I don't want to do it. If you talk to doctors, excessively if you take the drug, you're rolling the dice, we don't know what the long-term effects are. We do know however what three things you can do to have more energy: get more sleep, eat better, do exercises. So choices that you put in the hard work, or you just pop a pill when you don't know the long term effects.

Become a guinea pig and your wife's doctor she says--

A firm no.

No way,

No way.