Hiding strangles

Ample Prosecco

Ample Prosecco

Still wittering on
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13 October 2017
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A friend's horse died last night after poor bioecurity and not acting to isolate ill horses on a yard. We can't prevent all occurences of strangles but we certainly can stop it spreading freely. Burying heads in sand and refusing to lock down is just so irresponsible. Utterly heartbreaking and a completely unnecessary death. Not sure why I am posting but I can;t stop thining about it, so if this post makes one person re-think the 'let's just keep schtum because there's all these events coming up' attitude, then perhaps he won't have died for nothing.

-edited to remove potentially identifying comments)
 
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That is just dreadful. I was on a yard years ago that wasn’t keen on being open about a potential outbreak but they did end up doing the right thing. Not sure exactly why but the end result was good. My horse is moving yard soon and I’ve just paid out nearly £400 for the GPW so that I can be sure that we’ve done what we can to ensure we’re not bringing it into a yard of oldies. It’s not completely fail safe but better than nothing as I know his previous exposure hasn’t made him a carrier.

Strangles is a bit like Covid. Plenty of people are happy to suggest it’s not that serious in order to avoid having to take some action and do the right thing. So sorry that your friend and her horse have suffered so horribly thanks to some selfish ******
 
And as if that was not bad enough when my friend's horse fell ill and she got angry about the secrecy, the YO kicked her off for making a fuss -effective immediately - making an acutely ill horse homeless and forced to travel/move. Shedd had him from a foal, he'd never lived anywhere else. Who knows whether the additonal stress of travelling and moving made his prognosis worse. Its not my place to name and shame but I bl00dy hope she does. Place should be shut down.
 
Strangles needs direct contact to be transmitted. It's not airborne. 90%+ cases will be nose nose contact between infected horses and a few more from sharing feed or water buckets or grazing on infected pasture. If you stop your horse nuzzling others, and use your own kit then it is vanishingly unlikely that you will get it out and about.

Strangles numbers should be reducing because strangles should be fairly easy to eradicate: Stop the direct transmssion from one horse to another and it cannot survive because it does not live in the environment or air. It can only be passed from horse to horse. It would just die out as a disease if all yards were responsible. But instead numbers are growing.
 
OP so sorry for your friend. Unfortunately, there is still so much stigma about strangles that people still try to hide it with horrible consequences instead of being open and honest. If the horse communities could be more empathetic and supportive in such cases more outbreaks could be contained.

I have posted about my own experience before so if you remember feel free to scroll by. I pride myself on running a yard where all horses are well looked after but still went through a horrible time with an outbreak. I bought a new horse, had her vetted and a strangles blood test done, a couple of days later the blood test results came back negative. Two days later I picked her up and the following day had my vet look at her as she had the tiniest, clear nasal discharge, no cough, temperature or any other symptoms. My vet took a precautionary squab and the next day it was confirmed she had strangles. We immediately locked down the yard and implemented a traffic light system for horses and full infection control protocol in liaison with my vets. Lucky we managed to contain the outbreak to one block of stables which housed my RS horses and all the livery stables remained free from infection. Interestingly, the original mare remained symptom free bar that initial tiny discharge so it was thought she was perhaps a carrier but guttural pouch tests showed she wasn't so was just pretty much asymptomatic. We ended up with three horses showing symptoms and fortunately, all they all recovered well. It was a horrendous three months and between lost RS revenue, vets fees etc it cost me £20k. I will never rely on a strangles blood test again obviously. I was lucky that people who voiced an opinion were incredibly supportive although I'm sure there were others who weren't but I'm proud I did the right thing and was open and honest throughout it all.
 
I thought there was a vac for strangles

Unfortunately the bacteria can live in the environment, stables, water and cross from equipment

I once had an outbreak 20 metres from a yard but it's not airborn thank god

I once bought a mare at auction back home who turned out to have strangles and a few others picked it up, but it was all about on the ball precautions
 
Ambers Echo said:
Strangles needs direct contact to be transmitted. It's not airborne. 90%+ cases will be nose nose contact between infected horses and a few more from sharing feed or water buckets or grazing on infected pasture. If you stop your horse nuzzling others, and use your own kit then it is vanishingly unlikely that you will get it out and about.

Strangles numbers should be reducing because strangles should be fairly easy to eradicate: Stop the direct transmssion from one horse to another and it cannot survive because it does not live in the environment or air. It can only be passed from horse to horse. It would just die out as a disease if all yards were responsible. But instead numbers are growing.
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It's spread by all those idiots who allow their horses to 'talk to each other' over walls and fences while they are out and about.
 
There is a vaccine but it doesn't 100% prevent strangles, necessarily. It can make cases less severe. The spread, severity, and duration can all be lessened by vaccinating in most cases.

While it's not technically airborne it can still be propelled though the air onto surfaces.

I've seen many a horse recover from strangles when I worked at a sales yard as a young teen, but I've also seen some nasty and fatal cases. Even though I have (too much) experience with Strangles, I'll never take it lightly.
 
In the old days it was very often horses under 4 yrs and over 8 yrs who were most likely to pick it up

It's very very contagious

If you even have the remotest suspicion of a nasel discharge isolate

Because it goes into the abdomen or thorax it can't drain so easily as the head and may be fatal

One of the reasons worth keeping .New arrivals in iso
 
CanteringCarrot said:
I don't know English law all that well, but...how is this not negligence or some breach/duty of care type of thing?

I get that one needs money and energy for legal action, but that YO is an absolute...something I shouldn't say here.
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Lack of bio security ,failure to disclose, failure of precautions to prevent spread of disease known to be fatal
 
My shetland was exposed to it when a 'friend' of my neighbour put a stallion in his field without telling anyone. Thankfully he didn't develop full on strangles, but the mare in my neighbours field did. I nursed her through it (because neighbour was useless), all the time trying to prevent my other horses from getting it, which thankfully worked. Fast forward a couple of years and the same friend delivered a pony he'd sold my neighbour and that developed full on bastard strangles and was PTS when it couldn't walk. This friend was a bin end dealer (who lived in a caravan!) and is probably still spreading it round now 😡

OP I'm sorry for your friends loss. It is possible to prevent the spread, but not being honest is shameful.
 
Very sad. Where did she move an infected horse to? Most yards insist on a swab before a new horse arrives.
So sorry for your friend. Can yard be reported?
 
Nicnac said:
Very sad. Where did she move an infected horse to? Most yards insist on a swab before a new horse arrives.
So sorry for your friend. Can yard be reported?
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That's what really shows how much of a POS the YO is. Doesn't deserve to be in business, IMO.

To be shady and then boot the horse (and owner) is despicable.
 
As soon as YO told me to leave I’d have been on every social media platform there is and every page there was shouting it from the rooftops. I’d also be calling my vet and the yard owners vets to report this and also to report that the YO was telling us to move a sick strangles infected horse. I’d also be putting that on the social media pages as well.

I’ve just got to the point in my life that I will burn it all to the ground if I’m getting set on fire for things not my fault. The days of passively taking the high ground are long gone. If I’m going down then the whole house of cards is coming with me. Especially to do with livery yards and the sh!t£ that goes on.
 
Nicnac said:
Very sad. Where did she move an infected horse to? Most yards insist on a swab before a new horse arrives.
So sorry for your friend. Can yard be reported?
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Well exactly - how and where do you unexpectedly move a sick horse to? She has her own transport and a friend offered her a field well away from any other horses or livestock so she could get him somewhere safe.
 
Ambers Echo said:
And as if that was not bad enough when my friend's horse fell ill and she got angry about the secrecy, the YO kicked her off for making a fuss -effective immediately - making an acutely ill horse homeless and forced to travel/move. Shedd had him from a foal, he'd never lived anywhere else. Who knows whether the additonal stress of travelling and moving made his prognosis worse. Its not my place to name and shame but I bl00dy hope she does. Place should be shut down.
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I hope she sues the arse off them. I'm not big on litigation but in this instance maybe a huge financial hit might make them think about their disgusting behaviour!
 
splashgirl45 said:
On a more positive note there’s a video going round Facebook of a YO going public about strangles on her yard and being very open about it… nice to see someone being responsible after all the bad stories
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One of our local rescues did the same thing recently and some people were shocked that she would be so open about it. There is absolutely a culture of secrecy. You'll hear a whisper that a yard has cases, you'll have a suspicion if they cancel events etc but there is never a public statement.

I turned up to an arena hire once and a member of staff said not to touch anything near the livery barn as there was ringworm going around but not to tell anyone. She only mentioned it as she was an acquaintance of the person I was with 🙄
 
Roasted Chestnuts said:
As soon as YO told me to leave I’d have been on every social media platform there is and every page there was shouting it from the rooftops. I’d also be calling my vet and the yard owners vets to report this and also to report that the YO was telling us to move a sick strangles infected horse. I’d also be putting that on the social media pages as well.

I’ve just got to the point in my life that I will burn it all to the ground if I’m getting set on fire for things not my fault. The days of passively taking the high ground are long gone. If I’m going down then the whole house of cards is coming with me. Especially to do with livery yards and the sh!t£ that goes on.
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I am only going by the FB posts which are out there in the public domain, but I don't believe strangles was confirmed until after the lady left the yard. She did warn everyone at the yard and on social media that there was a nasty respiratory infection on the yard when she left. I think she was right not to mention strangles until after it was confirmed, especially if she does decide to take legal action herself.

I also haven't been able to stop thinking about this poor lady and her lovely young horse. Such a tragedy, made so much worse by the fact it could have been avoided.
 
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