Report: recent study finds 184 suicides in Victoria linked to gambling addiction
Landmark study of historical data adds to calls for a blanket ban on gambling advertising in Australia
An assessment of coroner’s court data from 2009 to 2016 has found that gambling addiction contributed to 184 suicides in Victoria, according to a news report in The Guardian.
The report findings adds to calls for gambling ads to be banned in Australia to further protect the country’s consumers. An Australian parliamentary inquiry in June 2023 called for a blanket ban to be imposed within three years.
The research, led by Dr Angela Rintoul from Federation University, found that men aged between 17 and 44 made up the vast majority of cases over the eight-year period.
The report was published in the Lancet Regional Health journal and funded by the National Suicide Prevention Research Fund, which is overseen by Suicide Prevention Australia on behalf of the federal government.
Dr Rintoul acknowledged the numbers of gambling-related suicides could be much higher than reported as gambling addiction was not routinely investigated by coroners, with the research limited to the presence of specific words in the coroner’s report, such as ‘gambling’, ‘wagering’ and ‘betting’.
Quotes in The Guardian attributed to Dr Rintoul said: “This study shows that gambling contributes to a considerable proportion of suicide cases.
“Coroners could consider whether there may be opportunities in the death investigation process to improve the collection of information about gambling contexts in suicides.”
Nieves Murray, Suicide Prevention Australia chief executive, said that gambling-related harm is difficult to detect and therefore the need for the implementation of the parliamentary inquiry’s recommendations was urgently required.
Murray remarked: “We know that gambling harms are often invisible. Unfortunately, protective factors for suicide, such as social and financial supports, are compromised by the financial harms of gambling. This often leaves people vulnerable to risk factors of suicide.”
Australia introduced a self-exclusion system called BetStop in August, enabling people to ban themselves from the country’s 150 licensed online gambling firms.