A new report issued by the Health Research Board (HRB) has issued its first report regarding gambling trends in Ireland revealed that gambling addiction is a problem linked to substance abuse and economic deprivation.
The Health Research Board shared that detailed information on problem gambling is still quite limited and urged the authorities to take the correlation between gambling addiction and socio-economic deprivation into account when making decisions regarding the number of gambling outlets in Ireland.
The government agency, which is responsible for coordination, funding and oversight of medical search in Ireland, has also called for more money for health services aimed at problem gambling treatment. According to agency experts, gambling addiction treatment is usually not taken with the same seriousness by the country’s Health Service Executive (HSE) as other types of addiction, such as the one to alcohol or drugs.
The report, which was published earlier this week, unemployed men living in financially deprived areas, who smoke and drink, are more likely to be among the 12,000 gambling addicts in the country.
Unemployed Males in Financially Deprived Areas Likely to Be Most Affected, the HRB Report Says
Using the resources of the National Drug and Alcohol Survey (NDAS) from 2019/2020, the Health Research Board has found that almost 50% of people over 15 years (about 1.9 million) had participated in gambling activities in the previous 12 months. Its most recent report has revealed that purchasing lottery tickets or scratch cards in land-based outlets was the gambling activity that was most commonly reported (about 42%), followed by gambling in bookmakers’ outlets (about 9%).
As mentioned above, male Irish residents (51%) were more likely than female ones (47%) to have gambled over the last 12 months. However, female gamblers were more likely to have purchased a lottery ticket or a scratch card than men (43.2% in comparison to 41.6%, respectively).
The study also found a 20% in overall gambling in the country, with the figures decreasing from 2,377,000 in 2014/2015 to 1,900,000 in 2019/2020. A local addiction counsellor with Extern Problem Gambling – Barry Grant – has explained that the most recent figures showing a reduction in problem gambling among Irish residents might be underestimated. As he explained, young males are under-represented in the sample group that took part in the survey, while they are the most likely to become problem gamblers.
According to the results of the research, about 90,000 adult Irish residents are classified as low-risk gamblers, about 35,000 are gamblers exposed at moderate risk, while 12,000 adult Irish residents are considered gambling addicts. The study found that people in the most disadvantaged one-fifth of the country’s population (55%) were most likely to have participated in any form of gambling in comparison to the ones in the most affluent group of users (50.2%).
Although people who were employed were more likely to have taken part in a certain form of gambling in 2021 (54.1%) than the ones unemployed (49.5%), people who did not have jobs were the ones more likely to meet the gambling addiction criteria, the report states. In addition, the research found there was a link between substance use and problem gambling, with 13% of people suffering from alcohol use disorder also categorised as being at risk or being problem gamblers in comparison to the ones who rarely drank alcohol.
- Author
Daniel Williams
