Self-Retraint...

Goes out the door with this consumer-friendly Parkinson's disease drug. Before you know it, the economists will make sure the drug gets placed in every city's water supply:

Dr. Leo Verhagen, a Parkinson's specialist ... says he and some colleagues all have a few patients who developed compulsive gambling while taking Mirapex, a drug that relieves tremors and stiffness. The behavior usually disappears when the drug dose is lowered, Verhagen said.

...California attorney Daniel Kodam, who filed the lawsuit last year, said he's spoken with more than 200 Mirapex patients who developed compulsive behaviors, including excessive gambling, sex and shopping.

...Mirapex was among top-selling Parkinson's drugs last year, with more than $200 million in U.S. sales, according to IMS Health, a pharmaceutical information and consulting firm.

Mirapex, or pramipexole, reduces tremors and the slow, stiff movements that are a hallmark of Parkinson's disease. It belongs to a class of drugs that mimic the effects of dopamine, a brain chemical that controls movement and is deficient in Parkinson's disease.

Mirapex targets dopamine receptors in a brain region associated with emotions that include pleasure and reward-seeking behavior, Dodd said. It can also cause extreme sudden sleepiness.

...Though a few of the Mayo patients took related drugs, Dodd said most used Mirapex. They included a 68-year-old man who lost more than $200,000 at casinos over six months and a 41-year-old computer programmer who became "consumed" with Internet gambling, losing $5,000 within a few months.