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MANILA: Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. will examine policy options to address the online gambling crisis gripping the nation, his office said on Saturday, as calls mount for the government to enact tighter regulations, or ban internet betting completely.

Concerns are growing over the rising number of Filipinos battling addiction to online gambling, which has become more accessible through social media and e-wallet platforms. 

Marcos is planning to convene a conference of stakeholders to help develop a policy to tackle the crisis, the Presidential Communications Office said in a statement issued on Saturday. 

“The president underscored the need to carefully examine policy options, saying an outright ban on online gambling is not (necessarily the) solution,” the statement read.  

Marcos recently told a media gathering that “a ban will not take care of the problem,” adding that his administration seeks to identify its root cause. 

“We really have this tendency sometimes, when there’s a problem, we just ban it. It’s not necessarily the solution,” Marcos said, according to a transcript supplied by his office. “Maybe it is. Maybe after all the discussions, we’ll conclude that a ban is necessary — then we’ll implement a ban. But let’s study it properly. Let’s not jump into it impulsively. We have to be measured in our responses. If it comes down to a ban, then we will ban. But if there are better solutions than a ban, we will take those on.”

Online gambling has been called a “silent epidemic” in the Philippines, amid a surge in cases that have sometimes reportedly torn families apart, depleted savings and pushed students into financial ruin. 

While there is no official data on how many Filipinos are addicted to online gambling, a 2023 survey by Capstone-Intel found that 64 percent of the nation’s 117 million-strong population had tried online betting. More than 80 gaming platforms run by local operators are legally registered with the government, and the revenue from e-games has also become a key source of government revenue. 

In the first half of 2025, the government’s gaming regulator — the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation — recorded a gross gaming revenue of 114.83 billion pesos, (around $2 billion) from the e-gaming sector alone, accounting for more than 50 percent of the government’s total gaming revenues over the same period.

Last month, Senator Juan Miguel Zubiri filed a bill seeking to ban all forms of online gambling in the country, saying in a statement issued on July 4 that the practice was “quietly harming” Filipinos, especially minors and the most vulnerable. 

The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines has also called on the government to “declare any type of online gambling illegal.” CBCP president Cardinal Pablo Virgilio David said in a pastoral letter: “This is no longer a simple problem of individuals. It is now a public health crisis in our society, just like drug addiction, alcoholism and other types of addiction. It destroys not only the individual but also their families.”

Others, like Senator Sherwin Gatchalian, are pushing for tighter regulations — including raising the minimum age of players from 18 to 21 and prohibiting e-wallets from providing direct links to online gambling platforms — rather than an outright ban. 

DigiPlus Interactive, which operates gaming sites BingoPlus, ArenaPlus and GameZone, has said that banning licensed platforms “does not eliminate demand for online gaming, but merely shifts users to unregulated black markets,” and that it supports tighter regulation.