Sales of tickets to play National Lottery games were largely unaffected by the launch of The Health Lottery, a new independent report has shown. There were no significant changes in the number of times most of the National Lottery games were played before and after the launch of the new lottery, with the exception of the Hotpicks game, which saw a ‘small but noticeable’ drop in players. The Health Lottery was launched in October 2011 by Richard Desmond’s Northern and Shell group and is the masthead for a collective of countrywide society lotteries donating to local health-based charities. Information from the report, which was compiled by NERA economic consulting, will aid the Government as it launches a consultation into whether to change the minimum level society lotteries have to donate to charity, which is presently set at 20%. The Health Lottery currently donates the minimum rate, while The National Lottery donates 28%, with a fifth of that fund going to arts causes.
