Volberg, Lancet Public Health Commission Call for Gambling to be Prioritized as a Global Public Health Issue
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Gambling harms expert Rachel Volberg, research professor in epidemiology, was among the members of the international Lancet Public Health Commission on Gambling that recently published a 45-page report calling for regulatory reform to tackle the health impacts of the rapid global expansion of commercial gambling.
The report was presented last month at a World Health Organization conference in Lisbon. The commission brought together a multidisciplinary group of leading experts in gambling studies, public health, global health policy, risk control and regulatory policy, alongside contributors who have firsthand experience of gambling harms.
The commissioners from around the globe met regularly and remotely for two years. After reviewing the literature and figures generated from a systematic review and meta-analysis, they concluded that “gambling poses a threat to public health, the control of which requires a substantial expansion and tightening of gambling industry regulation.”
“We worked hard in the final stages of the project to develop a set of five key messages,” says Volberg, lead investigator of UMass Amherst’s groundbreaking Social and Economic Impacts of Gambling in Massachusetts (SEIGMA) study.
Those key takeaways are:
- Gambling harms are far more substantial than previously understood, exacerbated by rapid global expansion and digital transformation of the gambling industry.
- Harms from gambling include physical and mental health problems, relationship breakdown, heightened risk of suicide and domestic violence, increased crime, loss of employment and financial losses.
- An estimated 80 million adults globally experience gambling disorder or problematic gambling.
- The harms of gambling are not evenly distributed; adolescents, children and those from disadvantaged socioeconomic groups are more at risk. Lower- and middle-income countries are less equipped to regulate the industry and deal with the harms it generates.
- Effective and well-resourced regulatory controls and international leadership are urgently needed to reduce the impact of commercial gambling on public health and protect progress on UN Sustainable Development Goals.
Massachusetts serves as an example of a U.S. state that attempts to understand and mitigate the potential negative impacts of gambling. After the Massachusetts Legislature passed the Expanded Gaming Act in 2011, Volberg and team were chosen by the Massachusetts Gaming Commission to undertake what is believed to be the most comprehensive study on the impacts of introducing casinos into a jurisdiction.
“Massachusetts is the rare exception to gambling legalization in the U.S., where public health is seldom taken into consideration when new forms of gambling are introduced,” Volberg says. “This leads to the implementation of measures that are focused on individual gamblers and don’t address industry practices. Given the rapid expansion of legal sports betting and online gambling in the U.S. since 2018, there is much more that can and should be done from a public health perspective.”
The commission stresses that global leadership will be needed to ensure gambling is prioritized as a global public health issue. It asks that UN entities, particularly the WHO, and intergovernmental organizations incorporate a focus on gambling harms into their strategies and workplans for improving health and well-being broadly.