You heard it on No Te Duermas
On the radio program, we spoke with Franco Torales, Secretary of Youth of La Matanza, who referred to the complex issue of betting in adolescents.
Tomás Modini
@ModiniTomas
The problem of gambling
At the beginning of the talk on No Te Duermas, Franco Torales referred to gambling addiction: “Gambling addiction is the term used within mental health. It is a problem that is growing, today with the advance of technology clearly, because it is accessible to any human being. The issue of gambling consumption has always existed, from previous times, but they always went to a physical space to be able to do it, such as racetracks, bingo halls, or they met somewhere.”
“We from the Municipality of La Matanza, in this sense Fernando (Espinoza) instructed the entire cabinet, we set up an executive table with all the municipal areas to be able to address mental health in a comprehensive manner. Within the approach to mental health and prevention, there is the issue of gambling addiction,” he added.
He then stressed that “it is a problem that has been escalating but mainly in young people and adolescents and that is what is serious because they are minors, because it generates a lot of problems both cognitive and attention or social and economic problems for the family” and that “gambling addiction has no age but it is serious that a young person is betting online.”
“The problem is that it directly affects the educational and cognitive development of the kids. That is why we from the Youth Secretariat and strongly with the Health Secretariat, are putting together lines of action and we are working with the creation of programs that have to do with the prevention of gambling addiction,” he insisted.
The social and economic problems that arise
On the other hand, Torales specifically referred to the games: “There are a lot of games that are a reflection of what is played in a physical casino, there are types of bingo, roulette, lottery games, and there is something for everyone. And that is the dangerous thing, first of all, they are teenagers, young people and there are even children and there needs to be greater awareness in families that this is a problem that is on the rise.”
“It also begins to generate social and economic problems within families because they begin to get into debt, to ask for loans, to use virtual wallets and that generates complications. That is why we are working in the Secretariat and I am very happy with the decision of the mayor to carry out this program articulated with all sectors and to get down to the ground,” he explained.
At the same time, he stressed that “we are going to work on prevention through the media, social networks and municipal areas on how to prevent young people from being gambling addicts” and that “I teach classes and I see that kids want to gamble, so we have to generate awareness campaigns through workshops, meetings and community outings.”
“In an emergency situation, we need to use the resources that the municipal and provincial government has so that a person with mental health problems can receive the necessary care. The idea is to create a large network of coordination with the entire community to prevent. Ideally, we do not reach the point of approach and action. With gambling addiction, we are in time because it is a very new issue, which is on the rise but families or society in general still do not see it as a problem,” he concluded in the first section.
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