How many pathological gamblers are there?
Most prevalence studies estimate that approximately 1 percent of the U.S. adult population meet diagnostic criteria for the most severe form of gambling disorders. The most recent estimates are drawn from the first national surveys to collect data about gambling disorders: The National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC) (1), published in 2005, and the National Comorbidity Survey Replication (NCS-R), published in 2008 (2). A summary of these findings is provided in the monograph, Gambling and the Public Health, Part 1, written for a non-scientific audience. The prevalence rate of pathological gambling has remained relatively stable for more than 30 years. In its 1999 report, the federally funded National Gambling Impact Study Commission (NGISC) stated: “[T]he vast majority of Americans either gamble recreationally and experience no measurable side effects related to their gambling, or they choose not to gamble at all. Regrettably, some of them gamble in ways
