The International Business Times has called for “sound methodology, transparent assumptions, and context-sensitive analysis” in estimating the annual rate of gambling-related suicides in the UK, as legislators continue to quote “debunked” data when shaping policy.

The International Business Times has reignited the debate over the accuracy of the methodology used by the UK government to quantify gambling-related suicides, with outdated PHE and OHID guestimated figures still finding their way into public discourse.

The regularly-quoted annual estimates, which range between 117 to 496, remain reliant on data extrapolated from a Swedish study published in 2018 and researched six years earlier, despite the work of domestic analysts to call for UK figures to be based on UK data.

“Experts, including Dan Waugh and Dr Henrietta Bowden-Jones, have urged the government to reconsider the reliance on international data,” reported International Business Times. “Waugh emphasises that while gambling disorder is indeed a risk factor for suicide, any statistics should be contextualised with rigorous and transparent methodologies.”

“Bowden-Jones has publicly stated that methodologies from countries like Sweden or Norway are not suitable for understanding suicide trends in the UK. She argues for localised research for the broader mental and physical health landscape.”

In 2022, Bowden-Jones – a former member of the OHID expert panel – told the Social Market Foundation: “We cannot extrapolate from Swedish studies, from Norwegian studies – it doesn’t work.”

This conversation will not go down well with the anti-gambling lobby which has been dining out on the unaccountable and unverified suicide statistics for years. The fact that only one gambling related suicide has been offiicially recorded at the UK’s Office for National Statistics, and countless questions in parliament have produced no additions to this number, it remains equally remarkable that the government, the regulator and the  health authorities have been happy to allow the mythical suicide figure of 117 to 496 per year to gain currency.

Northridge Law partner Melanie Ellis argued the same when she criticised the ongoing citation of “debunked” data, especially flouted by legislators when used to influence the direction of policy.

“Ultimately, any claim about gambling-related suicide rates must be backed by sound methodology, transparent assumptions, and context-sensitive analysis,” added the IBT. “Only then can public policy meaningfully address the complex issue of gambling harm.”

Who should we turn to for some guidance on this?

Obviously the Gambling Commission who last year made it a licence condition for operators to report any known suicides to the regulator which involved any of their customers or people who had attended their venues.

These figures have been collated for some 15 months now, but when Coinslot lodged an FOI for an updated stats account – it received a comprehensive three page response from the Commission on its collection of the suicide statistics.

However,  a summary of the GC response was simple – no, you cannot have them.

The Commission considers the subject matter  too sensitive to put into the public domain – both  at the time of our requesting the data, and as it seems, now. 

Given the proliferate use of the debunked suicide figures using the back of the Swedish survey fag packet, one might suggest the Commission reconsiders its position.

But there are other options for the real facts. The next obvious port of call for accurate data on gambling related suicides would be, one imagines, the one single  charity launched specifically to fight the good fight on this issue – Gambling With Lives. 

However,  it too has no data on the number of gambling related suicides that there are in the UK annually.

A request to GWL from Coinslot for their suicide statistics met with no response. However, their position as outlined on their website is to cite  the range produced by the Scandinavian model of 117-496 deaths per annum – the guestimate which the authors behind that  calculus believe should not be used as a model in other countries. 

So, when one authority currently collecting this data – albeit on hearsay and media reporting – won’t issue its statistics on suicides, and the one charity founded specifically on the issue of gambling related suicides doesn’t have an answer to the question – the idea of reverting to a survey in Sweden undertaken over a decade ago and disowned by its original authors, is hardly a valid basis to assess gambling related suicide figures in the United Kingdom.

And yet, with over £100 million now being raised through the Gambling Levy annually – on top of almost £100 million already contributed  voluntarily by the gambling industry,still, no one knows the number of gambling related suicides in the UK every  year.

It’s actually unbelievable – and unacceptable that debunked data is still being cited to determine  gambling policy and regulation.  

Unless, of course, you lived in Sweden …  over ten years ago … where the survey that set this ball rolling was undertaken and barely used to any great degree there.