Slots to smartphones: Pandemic sends Australia’s gambling problem online
For Rhys Wareham, a coffee industry technician from Sydney, the start of Covid-19 lockdowns in 2020 did not just mean staying home, but having to stop visiting
SYDNEY — For Rhys Wareham, a coffee industry technician from Sydney, the start of Covid-19 lockdowns in 2020 did not just mean staying home, but having to stop visiting the pub every afternoon to gamble on poker machines.
So he switched to a smartphone app which lets him track bets on his favorite sport, baseball, no matter where he is.
“The gambling itself doesn’t stop,” said Wareham, 31, who has a young child and is two-thirds of the way through paying off a A$30,000 ($19,968) gambling debt that bankrupted him eight years ago.
“Whatever hundreds of dollars I was spending in the afternoons at the pubs, it is now going into sports betting apps.”
Already the world’s biggest gambling nation in terms of loss per person, Australia has seen a shift in betting behavior since the pandemic-forced closure of public venues.
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