Bill Proposes for Anti-Gambling Education
Underage gambling has become such an epidemic in New York that state lawmakers and advocates want to introduce prevention awareness to children as young as the fourth grade. Assemblyman Peter M. Rivera, D-Bronx, chairman of the New York State Assembly Mental Health Committee, is sponsoring a bill that would introduce an anti-gambling component into elementary curriculums for students in grades four through 12.
The course would be added to existing drug and alcohol education. The bill also calls for the creation of the Adolescent Gambling Task Force, which would compile recommendations for the state on how to solve the problem. The legislation comes in the wake of a study by the New York Council on Problem Gambling, showing that 86 percent of adolescent respondents had bet on at least one type of gambling. Seventy-five percent of respondents had gambled in the past year and 15 percent had bet on at least one type of gambling on a weekly basis.
Studies show there are as many as 41,000 adolescents in New York state who have experienced severe problems with gambling. Those problems put them at risk for developing gambling-related difficulties in the future.
June 13, 2006
Posted By Michelle Johnson
Staff Editor, CasinoGamblingWeb.com
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