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U.S. House Agriculture Funding Package Provides Tremendous Victories For Animals

Today, the U.S. House Appropriations Committee released its FY2021 Agriculture Appropriations package scheduled for votes by the Subcommittee on Agriculture Appropriations and the full Appropriations Committee this week. The package includes $3 million in funding for the Pet and Women Safety (PAWS) Act that Animal Wellness Action worked to successfully get signed into law in the 2018 Farm Bill, and $2 million in funding for enforcement of the Horse Protection Act (HPA) of 1970. The HPA amount represents a doubling in funding for enforcement of the law against horse soring. The FY2021 bill also maintains the current ban on horse slaughter in the United States by defunding the inspection of horse slaughter plants on U.S. soil–a provision that's been regularly maintained by the Congress since the last U.S. based plants were shuttered in 2007.

“We applaud Reps. Sanford Bishop and Jeff Fortenberry for their leadership of the subcommittee and for providing additional funding to enforce the 1970 law that made it a crime to intentionally sore the feet of horses at Tennessee Walking Horse shows,” said Marty Irby, executive director at Animal Wellness Action and a past president of the Tennessee Walking Horse Breeders' & Exhibitors' Association. “We're also pleased that their bill maintains the ban on the slaughter of our iconic American horses for human consumption in the U.S. The Congress must pass a ban on exports of live horses for slaughter, but the ban on U.S-based slaughter plants is a key part of the larger effort to stop horse slaughter throughout North America.”

“No one should ever be forced to choose between their own safety and the safety of their pets, and full funding of the PAWS Act is a strong step to ensure domestic violence survivors are not separated from their pets,” said Holly Gann, director of federal affairs at the Animal Wellness Foundation. “Furthermore, the continued ban on horse slaughter plants in the U.S. should be a clear sign to the industry that it has no future here.”

Starting early in the year, Animal Wellness Action and the Animal Wellness Foundation pushed enhanced spending to enforce our federal anti-cruelty laws. In addition to funding the PAWS Act and HPA, the organizations are also pushing for enhanced enforcement at the USDA's Office of Inspector General to enforce the Parity in Animal Cruelty Enforcement (PACE) Act that AWA and AWF worked to pass in the 2018 Farm Bill and took effect in December of 2019 that outlawed all forms of animal fighting in the U.S. Territories. We are also seeking to create an Animal Cruelty Crimes section at the U.S. Dept. of Justice, to ensure enforcement of all federal anti-cruelty laws, including the Preventing Animal Cruelty and Torture (PACT) Act that President Trump signed into law in November of last year.

AWA and AWF have also led the charge to eradicate the painful practice of soring – intentionally injuring Tennessee Walking, Racking, and Spotted Saddle Horses' legs to achieve an artificial high-step known as the “big lick” that's prized in the Southeastern U.S., and worked to successfully pass the U.S. Senator Joseph D. Tydings Prevent All Soring Tactics (PAST) Act through the U.S. House in July of 2019. The increase in HPA enforcement funding will also help fund the PAST Act if the Senate approves the House bill and it becomes law.

The PAWS Act was enacted to help address the issue of domestic violence against pets and the lack of ability to accommodate pets in domestic violence shelters. The measure authorized $3 million yearly until Fiscal Year 2023 to establish a grant program to provide emergency and transitional housing assistance so that more victims can flee an abusive situation with their pet. The PAWS Act also amended federal domestic violence laws to prohibit an abuser from killing, injuring, harassing, stalking, or engaging in conduct that places a victim in reasonable fear of death or serious bodily injury to their pet. In the FY2020, Congress included $2 million to fund this grant program.

Santa Anita PET Scans Allowing Horsemen To ‘Assess The Response Of An Injury’ Over Time

The equine Positron Emission Tomography (PET) scanner pioneered by the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine, in collaboration with LONGMILE Veterinary Imaging, is now in heavy use at Santa Anita Park in Southern California. In just over six months since the installation in December 2019, with the financial support from the Stronach Group, more than 100 scans have been performed with the “MILEPET” (Molecular Imaging of Limbs in Equids), the PET scanner specifically designed to acquire images on horses without the need to lay them down.

Overall, 65 different horses were imaged with the scanner, with several horses imaged multiple times, several weeks apart. In total, images of 186 front ankles, 28 hind ankles, 16 knees, and 11 feet were acquired. As shown by these numbers, the front ankles are the main area of interest, as these are the joints most commonly involved in severe injuries in racehorses.

The first objective after installation of the scanner at the racetrack was to complete a study, funded by the Grayson Jockey Club Research Foundation, aiming at assessing the value of PET for identification and follow-up of ankle injuries. The study called for 24 horses with signs of fetlock injuries to be imaged three times with the PET scanner, with follow-up scans six and 12 weeks after the initial scans. All 24 horses have now been enrolled, and over half of these horses have completed all three scans.

All scans were successful, providing very interesting preliminary results.

“The PET scans provide very precise information about the injury,” said Dr. Mathieu Spriet, associate professor of diagnostic imaging at UC Davis and lead veterinarian on the study. “With a classic 'bone scan,' we usually can associate the injury with one of the bones of the ankle, but with the PET, we can really localize the abnormality to a specific area in a bone.”

This is of particular importance, as injuries to specific areas of the ankle bones are known to predispose horses to catastrophic breakdown.

Another benefit of the PET scan is the ability to see changes over time.

“As we have repeated scans six weeks apart, we have seen marked improvement on many of the injuries following treatment and rest, whereas other injuries remained active,” continued Dr. Spriet. “Being able to assess the response of an injury is very helpful to decide the course of action: deciding whether a horse needs more time off, a different treatment, can go back to the track or should be retired from racing – these are very challenging decisions to make for the veterinarians at the track. The PET images have provided objective data to support these decisions.”

In addition to the 24 horses in the Grayson Jockey Club study, more than 40 horses have been scanned at the request of their veterinarians. Horses were sent in by 14 different veterinarians coming from 26 different trainers, demonstrating how broadly the technique has already been embraced by the Santa Anita racing community.

As a Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scanner was also installed at Santa Anita Park earlier this year, another on-going study, supported by the Oak Tree Foundation, aims at comparing PET and MRI findings in the ankles of racehorses. Twenty horses have been enrolled in this study with preliminary results demonstrating the complementarity of both techniques to provide the best assessment of various injuries.

Another study, supported by the Dolly Green Research Foundation, has recently started. This study aims at monitoring horses who are resuming training after being laid-up due to ankle injury. The goal is to assess the ankle on a regular basis to be able to adapt the training, if early signs of injury were to recur.

“It is very impressive how much has been accomplished and how much we have learned in the last six months, thanks to the support of key partners and the hard work of the technical staff and the veterinarians at Santa Anita Park,” said Dr. Spriet. “We have been able to establish this new technology as a reliable, high-precision diagnostic tool for racehorses.”

It is likely that the knowledge about PET will keep growing quickly. In addition to the different on-going studies at Santa Anita Park, this technology is now available outside of California, as a MILEPET scanner has just been installed at New Bolton Center, the equine veterinary hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. There are also on-going efforts to secure the funding to install another MILEPET at the UC Davis Veterinary Medical Center, where it would be available for racehorses from Golden Gate Fields and for sport horses across Northern California.

The post Santa Anita PET Scans Allowing Horsemen To ‘Assess The Response Of An Injury’ Over Time appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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Asymmetrical Movement Common In Young Standardbreds

Scientists from the Norwegian University of Life Sciences and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences found asymmetrical movement in most of the Standardbred horses used in a study.

The group recruited the help of 12 Standardbred trainers across Norway and Sweden. They used wireless inertial sensors to detect uneven movement at the trot on 103 horses. All the horses had been broke to harness and were beginning race training; each was considered fit to train by their trainers.

Drs. Anne Kallerud, Cathrine Fjordbakk, Eli Hendrickson, Emma Persson‐Sjodin, Marie Hammarberg, Marie Rhodin and Elin Hernlund chose to study this group, which had an average age of 18 months, to reduce the chances of the presence of training-related injuries. All horses received a physical exam before the study; measurements were taken to see if any associations could be found with the uneven movement that could be detected.

Of the 103 horses, 77 were seen in-hand and on the track; 24 were assessed in-hand only and two were assessed only on the track. The scientists used thresholds established for other breeds to determine asymmetry. They determined that 94 of horses (93 percent) showed front and/or hind limb asymmetry in the in-hand reviews. In the track trials, 74 horses (94 percent) showed asymmetry. Though most of the asymmetry was mild, one in five horses switched the asymmetrical side for one or more parameters between in-hand and on-track trials.

The study team explored the prevalence of asymmetry, but not its underlying causes. It is unclear if the asymmetrical movement increases, decreases or stabilizes with age and training. They suggest that future studies look at the changes in asymmetry over time, and explore any associations between the asymmetrical movement and the development of clinical lameness.

Read the study here.

Hot Summer And COVID-19 Could Lead To Rise In Cases Of Lyme Disease And EEE

This spring, COVID-19 caused the shutdown of many businesses and organizations, leaving people with much more free time than usual. With not many options to occupy themselves while still remaining social distant, people began spending more time outside.

Spring is also the time of year when the tick-borne diseases tend appear. There may be a surge in cases of diseases spread by ticks as people spend more time outside in warmer weather. Dr. Sam Telford, a professor of Infectious Disease and Global Health at the Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at Tufts University in Massachusetts, has been collecting ticks from a variety of areas to test them for infectious diseases like Lyme disease, which affects both horses and humans.

The majority of tick-borne disease cases occur between June and August; dry weather can shorten the lifespan of ticks. Warm summer weather can lead to a surge in mosquito populations, which carry their own set of diseases, including Eastern equine encephalitis (EEE). EEE comes in three-year cycles, says Telford.

Many diseases carried by ticks and mosquitoes affect both humans and horses, as well as other companion animals. It's imperative that animals and humans be as protected as possible, which would include limiting standing water, checking for ticks daily, administering appropriate vaccines and applying insect repellents.