Calls to Virginia gambling hotline spiked once sports betting started in January. Not only have calls more than doubled in the first four months of this year compared to last year, but 64% of the calls in March, April and May were from men. More than half of the calls, or 56%, involved sports betting and/or gambling machines.  Read more here.

The National Council on Problem Gambling said the situation with online betting needs to be addressed. “We’ve seen an increasingly wide expansion of online gambling during the pandemic, including sports betting, Lottery, and social gambling, as well as various methods of cashless payment,” the Council said in a statement. “We expect this to escalate as more state governments face budget shortfalls in the next two years. Protecting consumers who gamble, as well as their families, needs to be part of...

Online gambling has some features that increase the likelihood of developing a gambling problem or make an existing gambling problem worse. These features include:3 constant availability and ease of access that allow people to play for long periods without interruption the ability to play in isolation use of credit card and digital payments that make it easy to spend money highly interactive and immersive environments that may cause players to lose track of time and money It has been argued...