A new study of online gambling conducted by the Direction régionale de santé publique (DRSP) in Montreal shows that 65,000 Montrealers — equivalent to the total population of Mirabel Municipality — started online gambling in the first year of the pandemic.
Posted at 5:00 am
The study was conducted by combining data from three sources: the National Institute of Public Health, which conducted a study on online gambling during the first 12 months of the pandemic, the ENHJEU survey, also conducted in 2021 by a group of Researchers across Quebec and data from the organization Jeu: aide et référence.
La Presse received this document, the title of which is telling: “The New Normal of Online Gambling in Montreal”.
PHOTO PATRICK SANFAÇON, THE PRESS
Jean-François Biron, gambling specialist at the Montreal Region Health Department
The trend of online gambling growth seen across Quebec is confirmed in Montreal, as regional figures immediately show. From 4.4% of online gamers in 2018, we are now at 12% of online game enthusiasts on metropolitan territory. About a third of Montreal’s gamers — around 65,000 people — would have started gambling online in the first year of the pandemic.
“When online gambling was nationalized in 2010, approximately 1.5% of Quebec’s population was gambling online. But the offer was not the same at all, and neither was the online habit,” observes Jean-François Biron, public health expert at the DRSP for gambling and gambling. “The upward move was already underway before the pandemic, but there was a sharp surge that was exacerbated by the pandemic. »
Every sixth player plays every day
A third of online gamblers only buy lottery tickets or scratch cards, games of chance that carry a relatively low risk of addiction. However, more than a quarter of gamblers (27%) play slots and a fifth (21%) take part in sports betting.
In slot machines (35%) and sports betting (32%), on the other hand, the proportion of problem gamblers is around one third. And the frequency of gambling is sometimes very high among Montrealers: one in six gamblers (15%) gambles once a day or several times a day.
More than a quarter of online gamblers in Montreal (27%) say they spend too much time or money gambling.
To “better understand the impact of the pandemic on the presence of gambling-related ailments,” we also examined figures from Gambling: help and Referral. The number of requests for help has fallen drastically during the pandemic, from 2,705 in 2019 to 862 in 2022. There has been a significant drop in requests for video lottery terminals, but an increase in consultations related to online gambling.
And now, with the major gambling sites reopened and accessible as they were before the pandemic, where do we go? asks Herr Biron. An increase or stabilization of online gambling? We do not know yet.”
For the DRSP, however, these numbers show that the issue of online gambling needs to be taken “a little more seriously” so as not to push, for example, lottery players to other online games where the risks are more relevant to students. In addition, new guidelines for the advertising of online games would have to be established. An information sheet for the general public was also prepared by the DRSP on the basis of this new data.
“A bumpy course” is in sight for the gaming lounge
And what about this playroom project at the Bell Center in this context? La Presse announced in late February that Loto-Québec, in partnership with Groupe CH, owner of the Montreal Canadiens, has been planning for several months to open a gaming room at the Bell Center. The establishment, set up on the premises of the former Taverne Moderne restaurant from 1909, was to have several hundred slot machines and sports betting terminals.
The DRSP has still not received a concrete project from the Crown Corporation, specifies Mr. Biron, and therefore cannot comment on it. “But we have found that the project inspires fear and anger. »
We are not blind: we saw that there were a certain number of people who had fears.
Jean-François Biron, gaming specialist at the Montreal Region Health Department, on the Bell Center arcade project
And one of them is Peter McGill District Councilman Serge Sasseville, who addressed the council on Tuesday to express his opposition to the project and his desire to block it.
“It’s a neighborhood where we already have major problems with crime, vulnerable people, homelessness, violence, drug trafficking and prostitution. So opening such a project at the Bell Center is out of the question for me,” he told the city council.
Mr Sasseville believes the project should definitely be approved by Ville-Marie’s municipal council, where he sits with five other elected officials. “I only have one vote on the municipal council, but I can assure you that I will be strong enough to oppose this project so that it never sees the light of day,” he said. I’ll paraphrase Bette Davis in All About Eve: Buckle up, it’s going to be a bumpy ride. »