Gambling harm costs Norway €526.2m annually, study claims
The total represents just under half of annual net revenue from the regulated Norwegian gaming market.
Norway.- A new survey from the National Competence Centre for Gaming Research has claimed that gambling harm is costing Norway NOK5.14bn (€526.2m) a year. The centre says that’s close to half of the annual net revenue from Norway’s monopoly-based regulated gaming market.
The centre made its calculations using a cost-of-disease analysis, dividing expenses into direct costs such as the cost of treatment services, indirect costs such as loss of production and intangible costs such as the emotional impact on the families of problem gamblers.
Taking a 2019 University of Bergen study that found that 63 per cent of Norwegians gambled and using the Canadian Problem Gambling Index, it classed 1.4 per cent of Norway’s population, or 55,000 people, as problem gamblers – up from 0.9 per cent in 2015.
The study estimated that gambling harm led to direct costs of NOK822.8m, with problem gambling treatment costing NOK157.5m, consequences of gambling harm NOK168.5m and NOK4.9m going to gambling-harm non-profits.
Recruitment, for example replacing people who lost work because of gambling, cost NOK321.7m. The study assumes that 1,320 Norwegians at any one time are unemployed because of gambling harm.
Also taking figures from the 2019 survey, the centre estimated that Norway’s two regulated operators, Norsk Tipping and Norsk Rikstoto, receive NOK1.71bn a year from problem gamblers, NOK985.5m from medium-risk players, NOK1.60bn from low-risk players and NOK5.68bn from players with no risk. Norsk Tipping and Norsk Rikstoto together made NOK10.58bn in net revenue in 2019.
Henrik Nordal, departmental director at the Norwegian gambling regulator, Lotteritilsynet, said: “These are serious numbers. This illustrates that problem gambling is a public health problem, and that it is absolutely necessary to protect vulnerable players.
“The final estimate of NOK5.14bn emphasises that problem gambling constitutes a significant cost to society.”
Norway has passed legislation to cement its state monopoly gambling system, with Norsk Tipping and Norsk Rikstoto the only licensed operators in the country. Nordal argued that the study proved this to be the right approach.
He added: “We have the strictest regulation of the games that potentially create the greatest damage. Although the report does not cover individual games, it shows that it is the right approach.
“The report shows that it is important to continue the work of preventing illegal gambling companies from reaching Norwegian customers.”
The Norwegian government has plans for DNS-blocking of unlicensed gambling sites targeting the Norwegian market. However, Kindred Group is standing firm against the threat of fines against its Trannel International subsidiary. Lottstift has warned Trannel International last week that it would be fined NOK 1.2m (€120,000) a day if it didn’t immediately withdraw its online gambling offering in the country.
