A significant piece of federal legislation addressing the public health impacts of fixed-odds betting has passed its final committee stage in Brazil’s lower house.
The Constitution and Justice Committee (CCJ) approved the bill on 13 May, with the result confirmed the following day. As it was approved on a conclusive basis, it can now move directly to the Senate unless a deputy calls for a full plenary vote.
Filed in November 2024 by deputy Ruy Carneiro (Podemos-PB), the bill creates a National Strategy for Comprehensive Care for People with Needs Arising from Gambling and Betting Practices, anchored in the public health system (SUS), the social assistance system (SUAS), and the existing psychosocial care network. The Ministry of Health will coordinate the programme, with the ministries of Education, Justice and Public Security, and Development and Social Assistance.
The substantive measures include specialised mental-health treatment for gambling addiction in every psychosocial care unit; multidisciplinary teams of psychologists, psychiatrists, physicians and social workers; priority access to public emergency health services for patients in treatment; and the extension of support to family members.
The text also requires the federal government to monitor and regulate betting advertising to prevent practices designed to attract children and adolescents, and authorises agreements under which operators would share anonymised behavioural data for epidemiological research.
Financing is to come from a percentage of the tax revenue raised from betting platforms, reallocation of resources from the National Health Fund and the social assistance system, voluntary contributions from private companies, the regular ministerial budgets, and parliamentary amendments.
Carneiro told reporters after the vote that public action had to move at the speed the problem demanded. The rapporteur in the CCJ, deputy Laura Carneiro (PSD-RJ), said the measure recognised gambling disorder as a question of public health rather than a private moral failing.
The vote landed days before a Câmara public hearing on 20 May, held jointly by the human rights and elderly persons’ rights committees, at which lawmakers and clinicians warned of a sharp rise in gambling addiction among older Brazilians.
The hearing presented data from the National Human Rights Ombudsman showing that between January and May 2026, 17,690 complaints of patrimonial and financial violence against people aged 60 to 90 had been registered. Several speakers called for stricter advertising controls and the swift passage of Bill 4466/2024, which would create specific protections for older betting customers.
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A significant piece of federal legislation addressing the public health impacts of fixed-odds betting has passed its final committee stage in Brazil’s lower house. The Constitution and Justice Committee (CCJ) approved the bill on 13 May, with the result confirmed the following day. As it was approved on a conclusive basis, it can now move…
The post Brazilian Chamber of Deputies committee clears gambling-addiction bill for Senate appeared first on G3 Newswire.