Thread

ER visits for gambling disorders doubled after expanded online gambling market

164 points · 157 comments · geox

whatever1 · 1789584798 · focus · HN ↗
All gambling should be state owned. It is a strict societal loss anyway, we can at least soften the overall blow.
Losses can be redistributed and cover for the externalities of gambling. And we will be able to control the knob on how addictive we make them.
For profit companies have the target to maximize their profit, so of course they will ramp up any method that can bring in more revenue.
1. pstuart · 1789585485 · focus · HN ↗
  Pretty much agree. But even then, the state should not be incentivizing its use (looking you, CA lottery and friends).
  Gambling is a drug, and should be recognized as such.
  1. ffsm8 · 1789587463 · focus · HN ↗
    Adrenaline is the drug, ain't it ... And gambling is just one way to leverage it.
    However once you realize that gambling is not the drug, and merely something that triggers your body to create a rush... Then can you really call it a drug? At least any more then any other of those activities?
    Eg Skydiving and basically any other extreme sports.
    And once you're there, you should really realize that it's not worth the sacrifice.
    This is a societal issue and should not be addressed with legislation.
    The only thing that can be safely regulated are things like disallowing marketing.
    toomuchtodo · 1789588952 · focus · HN ↗
    We should try GLP-1s. It patches the brain's reward center.
    GLP-1 drugs may fight addiction across every major substance - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47280797">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47280797 - March 2026
    GLP-1 medications get at the heart of addiction: study - <a href="https://medicine.washu.edu/news/glp-1-medications-get-at-the-heart-of-addiction-study/" rel="nofollow">https://medicine.washu.edu/news/glp-1-medications-get-at-the... - March 4th, 2026
    <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45907422">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45907422 (citations)
    There is a fentanyl vaccine approaching human trials, but I don't believe its mechanism works close enough to the reward center. Maybe gene therapy is a long term fix as it relates to the reward center dysfunction, to be determined.
    HN Search: fentanyl vaccine - <a href="https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=fentanyl%20vaccine&sort=byDate&type=story" rel="nofollow">https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
    Resetting the Brain’s Reward Pathway: Gene Therapy’s Breakthrough in Alcohol Addiction - <a href="https://scitechdaily.com/resetting-the-brains-reward-pathway-gene-therapys-breakthrough-in-alcohol-addiction/" rel="nofollow">https://scitechdaily.com/resetting-the-brains-reward-pathway... - August 20th, 2023
    mrguyorama · 1789591953 · focus · HN ↗
    I have recently found the following article interesting:
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FOSB" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FOSB
    Specifically the part where a variant of this protein seems directly implicated in the specific self upregulation that leads to changes in the brains reward pathways that seem to directly cause the sort of "Drug seeking" and other addiction seeking behaviors that are so harmful in addiction.
    I especially love the part where we tried inhibiting this protein expression with simple chemicals administered orally in rats and it significantly improved their addictions, and we did that in 2015, and we have not touched it since
    Gosh, wouldn't it just be the best if we had spent $4 trillion on bioscience instead of GPUs? I feel like we understand circuits pretty well by comparison.
    mitxela · 1789603923 · focus · HN ↗
    That's crazy that the whole reward system might just come down to one protein and how long you crave another reward is literally just the time until that protein decays.

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