Victorian population gambling and health study (2018-19)

This report details results from a large general population survey on gambling participation, gambling problems and gambling-related harm in the state of Victoria Australia conducted between September 2018 and January 2019. The purpose of the survey is to inform future research, policy, treatment and prevention efforts. This survey aimed to distinguish itself from past gambling-prevalence surveys by adopting new methods and measures to better reflect a growing trend to explore gambling behaviour as a public health issue. Past prevalence surveys have had the principal purposes of understanding patterns and trends in gambling participation, including participation by product (e.g., casino games, sports betting, etc.), as well as producing a headline rate of problem gambling in the adult population; which is sometimes referred to as disordered gambling in clinical contexts. This survey was constructed for this purpose too, although it adds new elements that better align the investigation to the public health approach by virtue of considering gambling-harm in the community at large. Browne et al. (2016) produced a report on gambling-related harm in Victoria that found a large quantum of harm was being experienced by gamblers who were not likely diagnosable with the mental health condition of disordered gambling. This report provides a population-representative sample replicating these results, and providing estimates on how gambling-harms are distributed throughout the Victorian community.