Cynthia Grant interviewed for ESPN story on rise of gambling addiction in young adults
Birches Health Vice President of Clinical Cynthia Grant was quoted in a recent ESPN feature story, 'We are broken': One family's fight against gambling addiction by Elizabeth Merrill and David Purdum. The article follows one family's experience with their son's gambling addiction during college, using it as a window into a much larger trend: a growing number of young adults developing serious gambling problems, often before anyone around them realizes what's happening.
The story centers on "Amit" (a pseudonym), who arrived at the University of Cincinnati as an honors student and, within two years, had lost weight, flunked out of classes, and drained his family's finances chasing bets. He describes how casual poker games in his dorm led to sports betting, parlays, and eventually a spiral that his parents didn't fully understand until they saw unauthorized bank activity and had to bring him home.
The piece places Amit's story alongside striking national data: a 2025 Common Sense Media survey found more than a third of 11- to 17-year-olds had gambled in the past year, a 2023 NCAA survey found two-thirds of male college students living on campus bet on sports, and a 2026 National Council on Problem Gambling survey found that 1 in 3 young adults had placed a sports bet before turning 21.
As part of that reporting, ESPN turned to Birches Health for context on how widespread the problem is. Cynthia Grant explained why gambling addiction is so hard to measure and so easy to undercount: "More people are gambling, and so therefore there's going to be more people who develop problems. So even if it's 1% or 3% of a specific population, there's so many millions of people that are gambling that those numbers keep adding up."
Her comment speaks directly to one of the article's central themes: that gambling disorder is often called the "hidden addiction" precisely because its symptoms aren't visible the way substance use disorders can be, which makes it easy for both families and institutions to miss until real damage has been done.
The story closes with Amit speaking publicly about his experience for the first time at a problem gambling conference, and his family's hope that sharing their story might help others catch the warning signs sooner than they did.
Being included in this story reflects Birches Health's ongoing work at the center of gambling addiction treatment, particularly for younger, digitally native clients who make up a growing share of those seeking help. As gambling continues to embed itself in the everyday lives of young people, Birches Health remains committed to expanding access to specialized, evidence-based treatment for individuals and families navigating this disorder.
Read the full article on ESPN here.
