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Race Horses in vaccine hijack - Recreational horses no chance, says vet |
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Written by Administrator
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Thursday, 11 October 2007 |
A Glass House Mountains vet claims the horse racing industry has
hijacked the supply of Equine Influenza vaccines to such an extent,
owners of pleasure horses would be “waiting forever”.
Dorothy Hofman, who works in Brisbane but owns two recreational horses at her Glass House Mountains property, said pleasure horses comprised 80% of the horse population, but were being allocated less than 20% of the French manufactured vaccine.
“Of the initial 8000 doses that were imported late last month, 6330 went to the racing industry and 1042 went to the buffer zone, which doesn’t include any part of the Sunshine Coast hinterland,” said Ms Hofman. “As I understand it, the racing industry offered to pay for those doses and therefore tilted the distribution very much in their favour. I heard on the radio this week that federal agriculture minister Peter McGauran said all of the 95,000 vaccine doses coming in soon would go to thoroughbreds only, including some outside the red zone.”
Ms Hofman said unless the pleasure horse industry was treated seriously and vaccinated in line with their numbers, the disease may never be eradicated. “I’ve been saying, “It should be vaccinated because of need, not breed’,” she said. “In any case, the disease has got out of hand in many places, with the DPI no longer testing or visiting properties anymore. They just don’t have the resources.”
Ms Hofman said she had heard of horse owners in the Logan and Tamborine areas purposely giving their horses the flu. They have obviously been keen to get it over and done with, rather than constantly being on edge,” she said. “Provided it’s done in a controlled environment, it might well be the best way to go. If all horses got the virus at once, it would be all over soon. As it is now, the longer you leave it, the more likely it is to mutate and the whole thing could go round all over again.”
She was also upset that the Australian Veterinary Association was supporting the DPI.
“I’m embarrasses to be a member of the AVA. The whole of the Sunshine Coast is contained in the ‘red zone’ of south east Queensland which is surrounded by a buffer zone, which starts from the Noosa Shire and heads south west through the northern end of the Kilcoy and Nanango shires.”
DPI&F Biosecurity Queensland chief veterinary officer Ron Glanville said vaccination would be targeted in very specific areas. “We are not planning a general vaccination of horses in the red zone in the short term,” Mr Glanville said. “We are conscious that many horse owners desire immediate vaccination of their animals, but initial supplies are limited and the priority distribution of the vaccine is being determined in consultation with horse industries. The first priority will be those large groups of horses that make a significant contribution to the economy and people’s livelihoods. This means racing precincts, spelling farms and other locations where high performance horses are kept.”
A DPI spokesman confirmed the racing industry was footing most of the bill for the vaccination program. “But no one is in anyone’s pocket so far as how the priorities are said,” he said. “It’s hard to argue that Dobbin, the pet horse in the paddock, should be vaccinated before a race horse from which several people derive their incomes.”
The Sunshine Coast is still free of the disease after it was confirmed last week that a horse belonging to Beerwah trainer Ray McCall returned a false positive. But Maleny based vet Tom Duggan hinted that it was only a matter of time before the virus came to the Sunshine Coast.
“Now that it’s reached Narangba (south of Caboolture), it’d more likely to come to the Coast,” said Mr Duggan this week.
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 11 October 2007 )
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Range News 2005 - ON 
