The Sky Is Falling!
Metaphorically, of course.
My job has been made immeasurably more difficult over the last few days by the fact that some idiot in a Quarantine station cannot do their job properly.
Equine Influenza has made it's nasty way into Australia. It's not generally fatal to healthy, adult horses, but it kills foals fast and causes all sort of problems in terms of training, breeding and general horse keeping. To horses that have never built immunity, it is far more dangerous. Just keep in mind what the common cold did to the Inuit population when they first came into contact with it.
It came in from Japan with a stallion that does both hemisphere's breeding seasons. (Japan had just endured a complete shut down of all racing because of EI. He arrived with a shipment of other stallions that was broken up and sent to two different quarantine stations. In two different states. Because that's clever.
Then he was placed alongside horses that came from other countries, who were at different stages of their quarantine. None of those horses are allowed to leave for another month now, even though their time would have been up this week.
He got sick with a disease that had shut down Japan's racing industry only weeks ago, and he was allowed to breathe on god knows how many other horses.
Blood was taken and he tested positive for EI. He was not isolated. 14 more horses in the station have now tested positive.
Some idiot went from the quarantine station to Centennial Park, where hundreds of pleasure and show horses are kept, and took the disease with them, probably on clothing that should not have been worn outside of bloody quarantine, especially with a disease that Australia has never seen before there. A disease that is known to be communicable via contact with humans. A disease that lives on surfaces outside the body for OVER 30 HOURS!
Horses at Centennial Park have now tested positive. After they have been traveling around to shows. They have passed it on to horses that have taken it to another state.
There is currently a ban on moving any equine animal outside of it's current property, Australia wide. Racing is banned. Horse shows are banned. Breeding season officially starts on Saturday, but has been allowed to start earlier, even though no vets are allowed to visit horses for any reason other than emergencies. Not to mention that a good deal of the higher quality stallions are locked up in quarantine for a month. 70 stallions will lose a month of breeding time, at best. If there are anymore cases, it's possible they'll spend most of the 4 month season there.
I'm even more irritated about this, because two years ago, one of our owners bought a stallion from a very large, well respected Stud overseas. He arrived at the farm where he was to stand and the vet there couldn't find his microchip, so couldn't identify the horse to verify him for the stud book. A DNA test confirmed that it was the wrong horse. The right horse had been sent to the Ukraine where he'd covered half a book of mares that should have been covered by the one who came here. They wouldn't release him because he was far more valuable than the one they had bought.
He'd spent month in quarantine and not one person had questioned the lack of a microchip, even though they'd signed papers to say they'd checked it against his documents. This horse did not carry a chip at all.
Quarantine in Australia has less strict procedures than a freaking chicken farm! I'm not kidding, it's actually true. As a result, we have a considerably smaller foal crop to look forward to next year. By thousands. And if we're really lucky and can halt the spread of EI, we may not lose a large proportion of foals from this crop.
My job has been made immeasurably more difficult over the last few days by the fact that some idiot in a Quarantine station cannot do their job properly.
Equine Influenza has made it's nasty way into Australia. It's not generally fatal to healthy, adult horses, but it kills foals fast and causes all sort of problems in terms of training, breeding and general horse keeping. To horses that have never built immunity, it is far more dangerous. Just keep in mind what the common cold did to the Inuit population when they first came into contact with it.
It came in from Japan with a stallion that does both hemisphere's breeding seasons. (Japan had just endured a complete shut down of all racing because of EI. He arrived with a shipment of other stallions that was broken up and sent to two different quarantine stations. In two different states. Because that's clever.
Then he was placed alongside horses that came from other countries, who were at different stages of their quarantine. None of those horses are allowed to leave for another month now, even though their time would have been up this week.
He got sick with a disease that had shut down Japan's racing industry only weeks ago, and he was allowed to breathe on god knows how many other horses.
Blood was taken and he tested positive for EI. He was not isolated. 14 more horses in the station have now tested positive.
Some idiot went from the quarantine station to Centennial Park, where hundreds of pleasure and show horses are kept, and took the disease with them, probably on clothing that should not have been worn outside of bloody quarantine, especially with a disease that Australia has never seen before there. A disease that is known to be communicable via contact with humans. A disease that lives on surfaces outside the body for OVER 30 HOURS!
Horses at Centennial Park have now tested positive. After they have been traveling around to shows. They have passed it on to horses that have taken it to another state.
There is currently a ban on moving any equine animal outside of it's current property, Australia wide. Racing is banned. Horse shows are banned. Breeding season officially starts on Saturday, but has been allowed to start earlier, even though no vets are allowed to visit horses for any reason other than emergencies. Not to mention that a good deal of the higher quality stallions are locked up in quarantine for a month. 70 stallions will lose a month of breeding time, at best. If there are anymore cases, it's possible they'll spend most of the 4 month season there.
I'm even more irritated about this, because two years ago, one of our owners bought a stallion from a very large, well respected Stud overseas. He arrived at the farm where he was to stand and the vet there couldn't find his microchip, so couldn't identify the horse to verify him for the stud book. A DNA test confirmed that it was the wrong horse. The right horse had been sent to the Ukraine where he'd covered half a book of mares that should have been covered by the one who came here. They wouldn't release him because he was far more valuable than the one they had bought.
He'd spent month in quarantine and not one person had questioned the lack of a microchip, even though they'd signed papers to say they'd checked it against his documents. This horse did not carry a chip at all.
Quarantine in Australia has less strict procedures than a freaking chicken farm! I'm not kidding, it's actually true. As a result, we have a considerably smaller foal crop to look forward to next year. By thousands. And if we're really lucky and can halt the spread of EI, we may not lose a large proportion of foals from this crop.