Swiss Stress Perils of Web Addiction

Zurich, the Swiss financial capital, on Tuesday started a poster campaign to warn Web surfers of the dangers associated with addiction to the Internet and visiting chat rooms and pornographic sites, Reuters reports.

Along with the poster initiative, the Department for the Prevention of Addiction also released a questionnaire for Internet users and addicts to assess their problems, or their potential to end up with one, according to Reuters.

“Spending lots of time in virtual worlds, especially chat rooms, online games and sex sites, can lead to a dependence comparable to other addictions,” a department statement said, Reuters reports.

The department also said that roughly 50,000 Swiss citizens are addicted to the Internet, or are in danger of becoming so, and that younger people are more at risk than older surfers, according to Reuters.

Web addicts can suffer mental withdrawal side effects and “they are at risk of facing problems in their social surroundings or at the workplace,” according the department, Reuters reports.

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