g treatment for problem gambling declined significantly during a temporary downtime for the lottery's VTL's, and rose shortly once they were returned to service (Carr, et al, 31).The compulsion is widely recognized, even by those in the industry. Gambling, including playing the lottery, is extremely addictive and is dangerous and destructive for some people. The new games "have created what was once an almost unthinkable link between lotteries and compulsive behavior." (Jones, 10).Despite significant annual revenues from the lottery, however, treatment of compulsive gambling receives relatively little money from the state. In Massachusetts, for example, the state budgeted only $450,000 in FY 1996 on compulsive gamblers, including only $120,000 for actual treatment, even though the lottery revenues for the state amounted to $720 million (Golden and Halbfinger, "Lottery," A1). On the other hand, the Ohio lottery is one of only a few that operates a compulsive gambling treatment operation as part of its regular operations, employing six problem-gambler experts. Five states require a telephone number for help for problem gamblers be printed on its lottery tickets.Many problem gamblers take their addiction to a new level as one case reported in Chicago. A woman, bent on feeding her gambling addiction, is accused of suffocating her seven-week-old daughter to collect on a $200,000 life insurance policy, "She would do anything to get money with which to gamble - including the unthinkable," federal prosecutor Ronald Safer told jurors at the trial of Dina Abdelhaq began. The infant's death was designed to look as though she had died from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.Abdelhaq's attorney, Scott Frankle, told jurors that his client has a problem "the like of which you may never have seen." Frankle said, Abdelhaq's sold her mother's jewelry at a pawnshop near two riverboat casinos in the Joliet area to gain money to feed her gambling mania. ...
