Can we truly eradicate EI from our shores?

At the beginning of this debacle nobody was a bigger supporter or believer than I, of the directives and assurances from the respective authorities, even if it took months, but after 5 weeks of being cultivated like a mushroom (kept in the dark and fed BS) I don't think we have a prayer. I know that the AHIC asked us to all act as a unit and support the racing industry but sitting meekly by and waiting for them and the authorities to throw us a bone, well it's just not going to happen. Racing authorities are acting with so much self interest that they were allowed to operate as if they were some species apart and have now suffered the consequences, unfortunately making the situation much worse for everybody. And even then they tried to blame somebody else in the horse industry!

But I've got off track. Let's look at the facts. First, the relaxation of the quarantine rules, making it possible for shuttle stallions to function. Now I know that the benefits have spread to the rest of the horse industry (please, can we all think up another name for the "pleasure" horse industry) but AQUIS would never have softened quarantine for the rest of us mugs. And I think the pain of the next 12mths is going to wipe out any gains we might have made on their coat tails.

And let's look at what we've learned about this virus and see if, even without quarantine breaches, we really had a prayer of keeping it out. It is now accepted, even by the DPI, that it can and will be carried airborne for up to at LEAST 2km, one cough can carry it 30 mtrs. It certainly makes a mockery of the 5mtr double fencing rule required for Australian standards for both home grown and overseas approved centres. Oh, don't forget that it also has to be 20mtrs from an area where horses outside the quarantined area can be exercised. Yep, that'll make a big difference.

And I can't see the existence of shuttle stallions going away, let's face it, the thoroughbred industry might be on shaky legal territory by their exclusion of AI, which would allow us to go back to stronger quarantine regulations, but the only people who have the resources to mount a legal challenge are making a bucket load of money from the shuttle stallions.

Then we have vaccination and those elusive buffer zones! Well, seriously, even if all the 150,000 vaccines (that's 75,000 horses) arriving in the next few weeks were going to be used exclusively for the buffer zones, and none of it hijacked for use in the racing industry or special interest groups, we still wouldn't have enough. Have you looked at the size of the red zones, there's hundreds of thousands of horses there, many still without the virus. There's no point saying that it only covers 10% of Australia, 60% of Australia is desert. So in real terms the virus is in 25% of the area where horses might possibly be, but in real terms the figure is much, much larger, affecting some of the most horse dense and productive land that we have.

So there you have it, no chance of truly creating an effective buffer zone and no chance that we are really going back to the 6mths quarantine, so that it is inevitable that it will escape again. And now I hear one of the main architects of this marvelous AUSVET plan (I'm ashamed to say a fellow Queenslander) has gone on holidays. Yes, I'm sure the last few weeks have been stressful for him, and yes he had paid for his tickets, but surely the DPI could have let him go at another time. Or perhaps let him go altogether?

Sorry, a nasty streak coming through! All in all, it seems the most dangerous thing about this virus is the very compromised plan to eradicate it!

Debbie Dekker