BHA To Add New Races In Wake Of Flu

[Wandering Eyes]

The British Horseracing Authority will schedule additional races to help those affected by the new equine influenza vaccination requirements to prepare for upcoming major National Hunt festivals.

Thoroughbreds in Britain are required to be vaccinated against equine influenza on an annual basis, but in the wake of last week’s outbreak the BHA has mandated that all runners must have been vaccinated within the last six months. Those who received their last vaccination outside that time period will require a booster, which comes with a mandatory six-day stand down period to allow the horse to recover. The new races will be carded on or around Feb. 23 to allow horses that still require boosters to participate.

The BHA’s Tuesday afternoon statement read in part, “Trainers had been advised on Jan. 25 that, due to the concerning situation in Europe where outbreaks have occurred in vaccinated horses, and an unprecedented number of cases in unvaccinated non-Thoroughbreds in Britain, all horses which have not had a vaccination against equine influenza within the last six months should receive a booster vaccination. We appreciate that the six-day mandatory stand down period following vaccination, which is a welfare measure on behalf of the horse, will mean that some horses who were not subsequently vaccinated will not be able to run for a short period. However, to ensure a level playing field it would have been necessary to cancel all racing for a further period of at least a week.

“It was agreed that, if racing was to return, there should be stringent biosecurity measures put in place to protect the welfare of the breed and reduce the chance of further disruption. The sport is taking a measured risk by returning to racing this quickly, and for that risk to be deemed manageable then it was necessary that protective measures should be put in place. This includes the fact that horses that have not been vaccinated in the last six months should not be allowed to run. Put simply–without this we would not be racing. It could open the sport up to an unacceptable level of risk.”

The Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board also announced on Monday that it would be opening its borders to British runners again, but an EI vaccination within the last eight weeks will be required.

Leading National Hunt trainer Nicky Henderson said he will have some key runners affected by the new vaccination schedule, but he admitted overall he is just glad to be racing again.

“It’s been a frustrating two weeks, as we were snowed in before this,” he said. “Obviously we are all delighted with the news, as this is what we wanted to hear after everyone had looked at the situation. I do believe it was vital to start racing now otherwise you were never going to.

“We are only just getting our results back, but I gather they are all OK. We have still got some more to come, but I imagine they will be all right. We have got one or two frustrations because of the vaccinations–it has caught out one or two horses as they have just fallen outside of the window. We have just got to juggle a few things around, which is frustrating. Everyone uses different vaccination programmes. A certain percentage will be fine, but others won’t.

“We have just got to get our heads round a few things,” he added. “We can sort them out today and they would be able to run next week, but that it is no good for many of them as for some these were the only races they could run in.”

Trainer Olly Murphy last vaccinated the majority of his horses in July, and thus he will be more heavily affected. Murphy was not mincing words on his feelings about the situation, saying, “It’s absolute madness. I worked for Gordon Elliott for five years, he vaccinates his horses once a year–which is completely legitimate–so I’ve always done the same. Barring a handful, I vaccinated all my horses on July 12. I’ll now have to vaccinate them all again and although they’re saying we can run them again seven days later, it will probably be 10 to 14 days before I have another runner as they’ll need a bit of time to get over it.

“I know Paul Nicholls vaccinates all his horses in January, which is fine, but there’ll be a lot of trainers in the same position as we are. I have a hundred horses and I now need to ring all the owners and tell them that even though racing is back on, their horses can’t run. They’ve basically changed the rules at 11:30 p.m. [Monday] night and a lot of trainers are no better off this morning than they were yesterday. This is no way to run a sport.”

Paul Nicholls said, “I’m delighted that we are racing again, but I know not everyone is happy due to a few things. But we are racing again and that is most important thing.

“From my point of view our horses get done twice a year and they all had it in January. We’ve got lots of horses to run so we can now get on with it.

“I was sitting on the fence a bit–I would have been quite disappointed if racing had not been giving the go-ahead, but in the circumstances something had to be done. They have come up with a sensible answer in a difficult situation.

Trainer Colin Tizzard also defended the BHA in their handling of the situation.

“Looking back at it, you have got to take your hat off to them as they have stood their ground,” he said. “It has taken a bit of sorting out and we did start to push them a bit to get going, but now they have it is good to have racing back. They have got together and put the right races on.

“We vaccinate our horses twice a year and they were all done around Christmas and in the first week in January. We’ve not had any word from the BHA that we are clear, but then we have had no word we are not. We have to give credit where it is due, as this is an untold scenario. We can’t knock them as we are back racing and it is all fine now.”

BHA Chief Executive Nick Rust estimated the six-day racing shutdown has cost the industry “several million a day”, but he said he stands by the BHA’s decisions.

“First and foremost we were focused on what would the disruption be for the animals–we have got to look after the health of the animals. We put our hands up when we make errors and we are pretty self-critical where we feel there needs to be improvement from ourselves. On this one, faced with the evidence we had, who would have taken the risk with that for the health of horses and the future of racing?

“We have a veterinary committee drawn from across the industry, the BHA has got 20 employed vets, the vast majority of our staff worked in racing–if you cut us open, like a stick of rock we have ‘we love racing’ through us. We would make the same decision again and we absolutely stand by our decision. The BHA team has worked morning, noon and night on this–we will stand back and say ‘which bits could have gone even better’–but I think the fundamentals have been spot on.”

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