Oh-Kyung Lim “As the demand for counseling has increased, we need to redesign the allocation of personnel and budget.”

Oh-Kyung Lim “As the demand for counseling has increased, we need to redesign the allocation of personnel and budget.”

(Seoul = Yonhap News) Reporter Ahn Jung-hoon = The number of teenagers who received treatment and counseling for gambling problems has nearly doubled over the past three years, but it was pointed out on the 25th that the number of counselors dedicated to them is limited to six and that an increase is needed.

According to data submitted by Lim Oh-kyung, a member of the National Assembly Culture, Sports and Tourism Committee, and the Democratic Party of Korea, from the Korea Gambling Problem Prevention and Treatment Institute, the number of people under the age of 19 using treatment services was 4,387 as of July of this year.

The number of users increased from 2,093 in 2023 to 4,144 in 2024 and 5,838 in 2025. The number of new consultations increased by approximately 178.9% in the two years from 2023 to 2025.

In contrast, the number of youth counselors assigned to 15 regional centers nationwide increased from 3 in 2023 to 6 in 2024 and has remained the same to this day.

Accordingly, the number of youth handled by one dedicated person increased from 691 in 2024 to 973 in 2025.

The remaining 9 centers that are not youth-focused healing centers, including Central, Northern Gyeonggi, Daejeon-Chungnam, Jeonbuk, Gwangju-Jeonnam, and Daegu, do not have a single counselor dedicated to youth.

The healing center trained 265 youth counselors over two years, including 113 in 2024 and 152 in 2025, but it is also considered a problem that only 6 people are actually deployed to the field.

Rep. Lim emphasized, “If we train 265 dedicated counselors and deploy only 6, the training performance is just numbers. In a situation where the demand for on-site counseling has more than doubled, we need to completely redesign the deployment of personnel and budget to meet the demand.”