Equine fatality rates in Arizona aren't getting better.
That was one takeaway from the track safety report provided by state veterinarian Dr. Sue Gale at this week's meeting of the Arizona Racing Commission.
Gale revealed that the statewide average catastrophic injury rate was 3.34 per 1,000 starts for the past fiscal year — well more than twice the national average from 2021 of 1.39. When split by track, Gale indicated that Arizona Downs had a comparatively safe meet last summer with a rate of 1.37 per 1,000 starts, while the Turf Paradise meeting that started in November was 2.99 per 1,000 starts through the end of March.
Gale did not provide a rate for Rillito Park's recent meet because “if they had one fatality, their rate would have been 4.00 [per 1,000 starts] and of course they had more than that. So the rate is somewhat limited in its value.”
One “start” is the event of one horse leaving the gate in one race; a field of seven horses leaving the gate in a race therefore translates to seven starts. Expressing fatal injuries as events per 1,000 starts when looking at a race meet, state, or nationally is intended to account for variation in the number of horses per race or number of races in a given location or time period.
Gale said that she did speak with the track veterinarian at Rillito after its opening card was marred by two horse deaths, and after the veterinarian began walking the track surface with the superintendent, pointing out areas of surface inconsistency, the meet concluded with two weekends of safe racing.
For a portion of the Turf Paradise meet, Gale had said she was the only veterinarian conducting pre-race examinations on horses, and has admitted in previous meetings she was unable to see every horse before they ran. She had also said the veterinary staffing shortage also interfered with her ability to review entries for high risk horses whose condition may merit further scrutiny. Over the past month, Gale said she had assistance from a veterinarian based in Texas who proved a “great resource.”
“As the meet goes towards the latter end of it, horses are starting to show some wear and tear and we're having to scratch several horses each day,” she said. “I think that's been a positive contributor to reducing fatalities.”
Gale pointed out that the fatality total in Arizona has been similar year over year for some time now. The 2019-20 fiscal year for the Arizona commission was shortened by the outbreak of COVID-19, but in that year there were 22 racing fatalities across all three racetracks. In the previous full fiscal year, the number was 20. This fiscal year, it's once again 22.
“We haven't really done much on an annual basis to change these rates, however I will make a note that the last Thoroughbred breakdown we had at Turf Paradise was March 4,” said Gale.
Another Thoroughbred collapsed after coming off the track on March 11.
Gale also noted that the Horseracing Safety and Integrity Authority's safety regulations will go into effect July 1, and some of them could force some positive change in the state. HISA will require the adoption of a voided claim rule, which Gale said “would make a huge difference in this state preventing some of these breakdowns that we have.”
Voided claim rules invalidate claims if the claimed horse is determined by a regulatory veterinarian to be injured in the running of the race, as a way to disincentivize trainers from entering sore horses in hopes of sending them to another barn.
HISA will also require the reinstitution of an equine safety committee to review fatalities and try to create prevention strategies. Gale said there had been such a committee in Arizona in the past, but it is no longer operational.
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