Bets affect young people and the search for treatment grows – 05/20/2023 – Equilíbrio

“Guys, I came to tell you one of the many cases that happen in the sports world: I became an addicted person. I started wanting to bet big. I got totally lost in it”.

At the age of 22, locksmith helper Lucas Nascimento used phrases like these on social media to say that he would stop placing bets. The day he published the text, in January, was the same day he was evicted with his wife and children.

The rent and food money was going to games. In one year, it was BRL 72,853.54, between wages and loans, while her monthly income was around BRL 2,000. The guesses involved football championships in Brazil and Europe.

“I was losing control. I was nervous, always trying to recover my money. I was completely addicted. Even wanting to stop”, he says, describing the feeling as “a very great sadness”, which he is “trying to revert in the best way”.

He is not an isolated case. Experts say that addiction to online gambling is advancing in Brazil and they see a rise in the search for treatment. One factor of concern is the increasing reach among young people and adolescents.

Psychiatrist Carla Bicca, coordinator of the Commission on Addictions of the ABP (Brazilian Association of Psychiatry) says that exposure to games already represents some risk.

“We have received many more people than before. This is reaching the offices and hospitalizations. It is something growing and in the last year there has been a boom. The pandemic gave impetus and the clinical perception is that with the World Cup period it got a lot worse. People started to bet more and that’s Russian roulette”, he points out.

The coordinator of Pro-Amjo (Pathological Gambling Outpatient Program) of the Institute of Psychiatry at the Faculty of Medicine of USP (University of São Paulo), Hermano Tavares, indicates that there is a progressive change in the profile that seeks treatment.

“The patient, until 2018, had an average age of 47 years and the game was mainly the electronic slot machine. Now, individuals aged 20, 25 years old are arriving”, he says. The bets range from the “little plane game”, in which the user wins according to the chosen altitude, to the second division of the Greek beach volleyball championship.

Between 1,500 and 2,000 compulsive gamblers have been treated at Pro-Amjo since its creation, in 1998. “The demand is constant. People are transitioning to other forms of gambling, and people who didn’t have difficulties with games have started to present”, says Tavares , pointing out that “the Cup was the beginning of a very heavy publicity campaign, greatly stimulating betting for a population that did not know about it”.

Advertising in the sector is the target of an investigation by the MPF (Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office) in São Paulo. In Goiás, a match-fixing scheme for football betting is under investigation. Meanwhile, a proposal to regulate the sector is under construction in the federal government. In the field of health, management expects betting companies to promote awareness and prevention actions on addiction. Ministries that design the rules were approached by the Sheetbut did not respond about the current scenario.

In São Paulo, the Gamblers Anonymous program, with groups that help with recovery, sees a greater advance in demand since December, a phenomenon driven by online betting. Stimuli for the practice and reports of loss of control spread on the networks. Mobile and television ads instigate and launch deals to begin with. “It’s your turn to win,” says one of them.

The confectioner Tamires Carvalho, 28, was attracted by an online casino platform. She saw the temptation on Instagram of a musician with 3.6 million followers. “He said he earned from R$ 1,000 to R$ 10,000 a day without leaving his house. He shows cars and mansions saying that he won with the money from the platform. I thought he would also make it”, she says.

She stopped playing almost three months ago. Two years ago, she received psychiatric and psychotherapeutic treatment with financial support from her mother. “I realized that it started to become an addiction when I no longer cared about losing but about recovering. I wanted to play 24 hours a day. , I went into depression, I tried to commit suicide”.

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Risk factors

• start betting
• Treat the bet as a financial investment/source of income and, in the wake of that, take more and more risks
• genetic predisposition
• Having someone in the family with an addiction (to alcohol, drugs, food or gambling, for example)
• Encouraging friends, influencers and others to gamble
• Convergence of media (Ex: video games that adopt the look and practices of gambling and games with a more playful look, similar to video games, encouraging people to gamble without realizing it;
• Have the habit of playing since childhood
• Have some other addiction
• Having trouble controlling yourself in the game since the first time you played, even if you don’t play very often.

Source: Hermano Tavares (PRO-AMJO/USP) / Carla Bicca (ABP)

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Gambling stimulates the brain’s reward mechanism, says Carla Bicca. Addiction is quick, according to the ABP expert, as it messes “a lot” with gratification systems.

“I go there, I play, I win. Then I lose. I try. When that is missing, the person has abstinence, they get irritated, anxious, sad, unmotivated, so they feel that they need to play. It’s like dopamine spurts in the brain, which is very similar to using cocaine or another drug. It’s a euphoria, a ‘high'”, he says.

For pedagogue Gideane Nascimento, 33, the sensation was of a “damned adrenaline”. Bets started at R$ 100 and soon went up. Until she started to win little or lose everything. “I got it into my head that I would have to get it back so nobody would find out,” she says.

The dependency record fell when he found himself owing R$ 17,000 and pawned the car of a person close to a loan shark. “I couldn’t stop. When I played, the money just felt like an algorithm, which in no way would damage my life. I felt powerful. When I lost, I felt powerless but challenged,” she says.

“Now, there are days when I cry compulsively and I can’t work. I have tremors, palpitations, fear of dying. I relapsed in March. I had not played for four months. Now I have stopped. It is a constant struggle. I am sick, but I am recovering”.

His treatment started this year. Nascimento also finds and offers emotional support in a group of people struggling with addiction. “Today I’m helping three people who were addicted. And they see me as an example of a way out”.

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10 questions that may indicate problems

Answer yes or no for an initial analysis, which does not rule out the need for an expert assessment

1. Do you spend a lot of time thinking about gambling?
two. Are you spending more money on betting over time?
3. Have you ever tried to stop or reduce the stakes but failed?
4. Do you get agitated or irritable if you try to slow down or not bet?
5. Do you gamble to escape problems or to cheer yourself up?
6. Keep playing after losing money to try to get it back?
7. Have you ever lied to someone about how much time or money you spend gambling or how much you lost?
8. Have you ever stolen to finance gambling?
9. Has gambling affected your work, relationships and family life?
10. Do you borrow money when you lose money gambling?

Saying “yes” to a question indicates the need to be aware. A positive answer to three questions means it’s time to seek expert help. In the case of five or more, it is imperative to seek treatment as soon as possible, as this points to a problem that may be affecting your entire life.

Source: NHS (UK National Health Service)

where to look for help

Anonymous Players from Brazil

PRO-AMJO
https://www.proamiti.com.br/dependencia-de-jogo
(11) 2661-7805

Look for a UBS (Basic Health Unit) or Caps (Psychosocial Care Centers) closer to your residence.