SYDNEY (Reuters) - Compulsive Australian gamblers seeking help from Gamblers Anonymous are being hit with online casino pop-up advertisements when they visit the Web site of the self-help group, the Daily Telegraph newspaper says.
Australians gambled away a record $11 billion in the year to June 2002 -- nearly two percent of gross domestic product and slightly more than the nation's defense budget, according to national statistics released late last year.
"This is when they least need that temptation. They are reaching out for support. Suddenly cues that allow them to gamble are there," Louise Sharpe, director of the University of Sydney's gambling research unit, told the paper in Friday's editions.
The tabloid said the self-help group cannot block the ads or take legal steps against the online casinos, which are based overseas. Gamblers Anonymous warns visitors to its Web site, Gamblers Anonymous.com not to open the casino ads and is trying to update the Web site so as to stop the ads.
More than 20 percent of the world's poker machines are in Australia, about five times as many as in the United States on a per person basis.
Yahoo News.
Australians gambled away a record $11 billion in the year to June 2002 -- nearly two percent of gross domestic product and slightly more than the nation's defense budget, according to national statistics released late last year.
"This is when they least need that temptation. They are reaching out for support. Suddenly cues that allow them to gamble are there," Louise Sharpe, director of the University of Sydney's gambling research unit, told the paper in Friday's editions.
The tabloid said the self-help group cannot block the ads or take legal steps against the online casinos, which are based overseas. Gamblers Anonymous warns visitors to its Web site, Gamblers Anonymous.com not to open the casino ads and is trying to update the Web site so as to stop the ads.
More than 20 percent of the world's poker machines are in Australia, about five times as many as in the United States on a per person basis.
Yahoo News.
