Michigan Anti-Net Betting Ads Are off the Mark

Interactive Gaming News reported earlier this month that the Michigan Department of Community Health has launched a $2 million public service ad campaign aimed at warning Michigan residents about the dangers of problem gambling. I wrote that IGN would be following up with further details once we received the tapes. The follow-up story never materialized because the tapes never arrived.

A Department spokesperson said the Department used the results of a recent Western Michigan University report on problem gambling to determine which types of gambling were the most dangerous and thus which types of gambling should be targeted by the advertisements.

The focus of the first set of commercials, not surprisingly, is Internet gambling. Four of the six commercials, says a spokesman from the department, specifically warn Michigan residents of the dangers of Internet gambling. The other two warnings take a broader approach toward gambling.

Internet gambling is undoubtedly a legitimate concern in the battle against problem gambling, a battle that should be fought on all levels, but the results of this particular report clearly don't suggest that it belongs anywhere near the top of the list. In fact, it's actually at the bottom.

Of the nearly 895 people surveyed for the study, "A Survey of Gambling Behaviors in Michigan - Final Report, 1999," five people (.06 percent) said they've gambled on the Internet and four people (.05 percent) said they've gambled on the Internet in the last year. Three out of those four people fell into the lowest of the risk categories.

Still, the Department of Community Health focused on Internet gambling as the worst of evils. Not money well spent.