With technological advancements come many benefits and disadvantages. One of the benefits is the easy access to literally everything one might be looking for through a single device. This comes especially handy during this period, where most shops and services that provide entertainment are closed. Amidst the COVID-19 outbreak, the number of people turning to online websites and platforms for entertainment purposes has increased astronomically. And among these people are avid gamblers, the number of which has been getting higher and higher on a daily basis for the past couple of months.
Ireland is no exception. This country has one of the biggest online gambling scenes and therefore, the number of online gamblers was high on its own. But, of course, playing at online slots and other games can be a fun activity, but only when approached with a healthy mindset and caution. And this is not something everyone can succeed at.
And unfortunately, with the increased number of gamblers, comes an increased number of people who have developed gambling problems. And Ireland isn’t the first country where this occurred. In Australia, customer spending on gambling platforms has increased by 67pc in past weeks, amidst the coronavirus outbreak. Countries like Belgium, Lithuania, Spain, and Portugal have already implemented all kinds of restrictions. Some concerning gambling itself, other advertisements of online gambling websites. In Latvia, for example, online gambling has been banned overall until further notice. And a lot of countries have also established similar regulations.
As for Ireland, there were some mandatory deposit limits that already existed, but this just wasn’t enough anymore. To combat this issue, Problem Gambling Ireland has called on the chief executives of the five largest gambling operators in Britain, including Paddy Power/Betfair, BoyleSports, Ladbrokes, etc to take the initiative over fears that online gambling could increase in popularity while betting shops are closed. This charity was established by Mr. Grant, an addiction counselor a few years ago. And on April 21st, the UK minister of culture wrote to these same online gambling executives to ask them to take extra steps to protect players, including implementing mandatory deposits, and certain spending limits on different games and individual bets.
As to why this is happening, there are multiple answers. But this isn’t a new issue, people were getting into trouble with gambling before pandemic. And while there’s no discernible pattern, the reasons for this problem have been amplified. Firstly, it’s the addictive nature of online casinos that are so important to this issue. They are especially dangerous for people that are transferring from real-life casinos to online ones. Mainly, because when a betting shop closes around 9pm or so, an online casino is open 24/7 which means that you can do whatever you want, whenever you want.
Another important aspect is the versatility of online casinos which overcomes all location restrictions. Online you can bet on tennis games all over the world, NFL, Australian horse racing, etc. You can never run out of things to bet on as there’s always something going on in the world. This is especially convenient for people who love betting on Live sports, who are all now turning to the online gambling scene.
Some casinos have nine different virtual events going on every two minutes, all day, every day. This presents another issue, their frequency. While betting on an actual event there are windows between races and events. This gives gamblers the time to analyze whether it would be wiser to continue or to stop. But at online casinos, this window barely exists. Here you can jump from one slot to another, without even giving it a second thought. And the games only last a couple of seconds, which makes you feel like you haven’t even been gambling for a long time.
To deal with this issue, there are more and more services like the UK’s gambling self-exclusion service, Gamestop, that are trying to help those in need. And even though, some measures have already been taken, the government still won’t know what effect the lockdown has had on gambling until some point in the future.
