Equine Flu Discussion & Updates

Thought it was worth setting up a separate thread to discuss the equine flu shutdown and answer any questions people might have about the disease and potential impacts.

Here’s where we are right now:

- Racing suspended until Wednesday 13th Feb at the earliest
- 106 yards in lockdown with all horses in those yards due to be tested by vets today
- Once results have been confirmed a decision on whether racing can resume is expected to be taken on Monday
- 3 vaccinated horses in Donald McCain’s yard have tested positive, as have 6 vaccinated two year olds in a pre-training yard near Newmarket
- While Flu is not usually serious in horses, if this outbreak spreads and gets into the breeding population it could have fatal consequences as foals under the age of 6 months have little natural immunity. Many studs are taking the step of requiring all Mares visiting their properties to have been vaccinated within the last 6 months in order to offer additional protection and breeders are being advised to vaccinate their pregnant broodmares (if they have not been done in the last 6 months) to ensure that some immunity can be passed on to their foals via their colostrum.

 

BHA's chief executive was on Good Morning Britain earlier saying that he does not believe racing will be shutdown for any longer than a few weeks. He was highlighting the speed with which they have acted and their 'war team of vets'. He must be quite confident of this to come out and say it on national tv.

 

Hi Princess. We have a visitor arriving on 18th Feb who has been to Donald McCain's yard not long ago. She was due to go there yesterday but obviously that was cancelled. She is coming over to see a system I have built but also to see one of our horses that she is keen to take back to compete in England; but she won't be going for a while. We are assuming that great care will be needed (ie.no clothes to be worn that may have been worn at home and have not been washed/cleaned, particularly coats/jackets, boots/shoes etc. Also we will be spraying the yard and car tyres before and after the visit). Is there anything else we should be doing? Cancelling the visit is not an option unless it is the only safe option

 

I think that’s all you can do Ron. The likliehood of transmitting the disease in this way is pretty small, so taking sensible precautions regarding disinfecting shoes, tyres, etc is the best way forward.

The only other thing I can think of is that (if possible) you could move the horse away from your others so that she doesn’t come into contact with the others and then keep the horse concerned isolated for a few days afterwards.

 

The test results can be turned around pretty quickly in themselves, the issue is going to be the sheer volume of them. In an item on the local news here last night they said the AHT is one of only 3 labs in the country capable of diagnosing equine flu. Since the start of the year they’ve carried out 200 tests, but now are going to have to do potentially thousands (at least 4 of the 106 yards affected have 100+ horses to test) in the space of a few days.

I’m guessing that they will take the swab tests and continue to monitor the yards by taking temperatures several times a day. If all results are negative and no symptoms are showing my gut is they’ll cancel racing until at least next weekend. If any horses start to show symptoms (raised temp, runny nose, etc) they’ll order a retest of the whole yard.

I don’t think Cheltenham is at risk, providing no more positives are returned, though some horses could well miss out due to interrupted training, lack of prep races, etc. I do think Donald McCain could be shutdown for quite some time though.

 

We do have 2 stable blocks, one of which has no horses in at present but only a drive way separates the two blocks. Not sure if that counts as isolation. In the past we have always kept all our horses at home if there is any risk, and never had the need to isolate one from the others. Makes feeding, mucking out etc a bit more risky. From what you say, it may be less risk for us as our youngest horse is now 3 years old. We do have a 33 yo though. Sounds as though it may not be as bad as the epidemic a few (7-10?) years ago. Will have to keep a close eye out and check with the vets if there is any evidence of it over here

 

Why is that Princess? As opposed to any other yard (eg PN)

 

Because he’s got the confirmed cases, they’re going to need to keep testing every horse in his yard until the incubation period is over. If any more cases come to light the clock will have to be reset again each time.

I know people are praising McCain for acting swiftly in notifying everyone but as I see it there are 3 possibilities as to how the flu got into his yard, and he is culpable for two of them:

1. He had new horses arrive in his yard and did not observe correct isolation procedure in keeping them separate from the main yard for the appropriate amount of time.

2. A member of his staff came into contact with the virus elsewhere (own horses/friend’s horses) and brought it into the yard - again a failure of disease control procedure in that staff should know that they should change clothes, observe correct hygiene, etc if they’ve been in with non-racing horses.

3. (The worst case scenario) His horses came into contact with an infected horse at the races or through a transport company failing to clean a horse box correctly. In this scenario it means another trainer has flu in their yard and has deliberately chosen not to notify the authorities and the genie is now out of the bottle and we’re looking at an epidemic.

 

The issue with the Aussie epidemic is that vaccinations were not compulsory over there so the virus spread like wild fire. Although this is the same strain as the Aussie outbreak (Florida Cade1 to give it its official name) it’s effects should not be that serious in vaccinated horses, it’s more the interruption to training schedules that is the concern for the racehorses and the potential for it to spread into the breeding population.

The problem with flu is that it is not a notifiable disease so if you get it you don’t have to contact anyone as you would in the case of EHV or foot and mouth, etc. It means that people can keep it secret and you may not know you’ve come into contact with an infected horse.

 

BHA due to issue an update this afternoon, they’re not expected to comment on resumption of racing but more likely that they will be detailing how many tests have been carried out and any results they have back.

 

3 more positives in the McCain yard.

 

One of McCain’s runners from earlier this week is one of the positives. That is not good news as it means the virus has definitely had the potential to leave the yard.

 

Or that’s how it got to the yard.

 

Possibly if the infected horse was the Wolverhampton runner from Monday, but it was already in the yard by the time of the Ayr and Ludlow runners.

 

Just been confirmed as the Ayr runner, RAISE A SPARK.

 

Latest update. Not good as there is a suspicious case at another yard that did not have runners at Ayr or Ludlow.

https://www.britishhorseracing.com/press_releases/bha-update-regarding-equine-influenza-case-2/

 

So that horse definitely had the virus when it went racing. Not good.

 

From the latest update:

“However, a separate suspicious case – which has not yet been confirmed as a positive sample – has been identified at another yard. No links have been identified between this yard and the original yard. This yard had runners at the fixtures at Newcastle on 5 February and Wolverhampton on 6 February, and as such the BHA has taken the further precautionary steps of placing all 54 yards of trainers who also had runners at these fixtures on hold and initiating testing of horses from these yards.”

174 yards now under lockdown and testing procedures.