Racing Victoria boss calls it a day

GRAHAM Duff, the inaugural chairman of Racing Victoria Limited, resigned yesterday - not as a result of outside pressures, but because he believed it was time.

Duff said the devastating impact from the outbreak of equine influenza and the extraordinary measures required in Victoria to keep the state racing through the spring carnival had delayed his decision.

"It was not my intention to leave it as long as I have, but it would have been inappropriate and grandstanding of the highest order had I decided to announce my decision while the EI crisis was in full swing," Duff said.

"It became a real target for me to see the carnival go head and be successful. For me, the timing is perfect."

Duff said it was immensely satisfying that Victoria had emerged free of the EI crisis that crippled New South Wales and Queensland and had been able to showcase racing at its finest.

He said he reflected on Melbourne Cup day just how much the racing industry meant not only to Victoria, but nationwide.

"I just stood there, looked over 100,000 and thought, 'How good is this?' " he said.

"And to have some part of that success over the past six years and have racing accepted and respected is enough for me. I don't really care too much what any detractors might say. I was only in it for the best of racing."

Duff, who will step down at next month's RVL annual general meeting, rejected suggestions he was frustrated or disillusioned by the call from a prominent group or 27 identities calling for his resignation last month.

"Definitely not. It's just that I turned 65," Duff said.

"If I had taken another three years, it would have been nine and I'm not sure anyone should stay as chairman for nine years."

While he said he was aware of his many detractors, Duff said he expected to have people with passionate views in such a large and diverse industry.

"Everyone is allowed to push their own barrow and have their own go," he said.

Asked to categorise his six years as chairman, Duff said: "I'm very proud of where RVL is. I think RVL both Australia and internationally is a very well-respected institution."

Quizzed on any regrets, Duff identified the death of three jockeys from race falls.

"I don't think we have done enough with respect to safety. I think we still have to do more. I can't stomach the deaths and serious injuries we've had," Duff said.

By Adrian Dunn November 13, 2007

Not airborne, experts says

THE most likely cause of the equine influenza (EI) outbreak in Australia was transmission by people or equipment which came into contact with an infected horse from either Mascot Airport or the Eastern Creek Quarantine Centre, an inquiry was told today.

Dr James Gilkerson of the Equine Veterinary Association said it was unlikely the virus could have been airborne and almost impossible that it was already in Australia.

The first horse confirmed with EI was Coolmore stallion Encosta De Lago who tested positive on August 17 while he was housed at Eastern Creek.

More than 40,000 horses in NSW have since contracted EI, causing losses of millions of dollars to the racing and breeding industry.

The inquiry before Commissioner Callinan is expected to last for at least a month with more than 100 witnesses to be called.

AAP

November 13, 2007

Signs of life

SYDNEY – Trainers including Gai Waterhouse, John O'Shea, Grahame Begg and Bart Cummings are celebrating a return to trackwork at Randwick this week.

“We’re back on track, literally! I returned to the clocking tower in the centre of Randwick today to train the horses. I have not been in this position for nearly three months,” said Waterhouse.

Waterhouse said standouts at Monday’s trackwork were Al Mahboob (Secret Savings).

Magic Albert filly Lieserl, More Than Ready filly Sambar and Fantastic Light colt Fizeau were among others.

Waterhouse was forced to be a spectator during the Flemington carnival because equine influenza had wiped out her stables and prevented any horse in NSW from crossing the Victorian border.

Racing resumes at Randwick on December 1 - a meeting that was yesterday declared open to all racehorses in NSW.

Waterhouse has 100 horses back in work in the wake of the EI epidemic. Forty of those horses will trial at Randwick on Friday.

Racing NSW met with the Department of Primary Industries yesterday to discuss which horses could attend the Randwick meeting.

Racing NSW chief executive Peter V'Landys said the program would be open to all horses. However, those horses travelling from green zones, or uninfected areas, would need to be segregated for 14 days once they return home.

The plan is likely to be approved by the DPI's national body in coming days.

Isolation key factor in keeping horse flu out of western NSW

The National Management Group overseeing the control of equine influenza says there are positive signs its measures are working.

While eradication continues to require strict biosecurity measures in the east of the state, the president of the Australian Horse Industry Council, Dr Barry Smyth, says the restriction of the disease in certain places has allowed a more free approach in areas like the far west of New South Wales.

Dr Smyth says isolation was a key factor in keeping the horse flu out of western regions.

"Very early on the movement restrictions were put in so that contained the disease to the eastern side there of NSW," he said.

"The other reason probably is that out your way there's much lower horse density."

Quarantine under fire over EI spread

The horse flu inquiry has heard mass vaccinations would not have prevented the outbreak but would have protected horses from its effects. (ABC News)

The Callinan inquiry into the horse flu outbreak in Australia has been told the disease would not have spread if quarantine procedures were adequate.

The head of the Equine Infection Disease Lab at the University of Melbourne, Dr James Gilkerson, was the first witness to give evidence at the inquiry today.

Dr Gilkerson gave detailed evidence about the likely cause of the horse flu outbreak, which has crippled the racing industry in New South Wales and Queensland.

He told the hearing that quarantine procedures had been inadequate in any country where there had been an outbreak of equine influenza.

He said each outbreak had been traced back to the air transport of horses.

Dr Gilkerson told the hearing Australia's outbreak was probably caused by an infected horse coming into contact with equipment or people at Sydney Airport or the Eastern Creek Quarantine Centre, where a lack of adequate biosecurity measures failed to prevent the spread of the virus.

Under cross-examination by lawyers for the Commonwealth, Dr Gilkerson pointed to inadequacies in Australia's quarantine procedures.

He said any procedures that failed to prevent an outbreak must be inadequate by definition.

Dr Gilkerson also suggested that all imported horses should be vaccinated for the disease once they arrive in Australia.

He said mass vaccination in Australia would not have prevented the disease but would have protected horses from its effects.

The inquiry was earlier told the outbreak in Australia was probably caused by lax biosecurity measures at Sydney Airport and the Eastern Creek quarantine facility.

A range of people will give evidence throughout the inquiry, including importing agents, grooms, vets and farriers.

The inquiry, headed by retired High Court judge Ian Callinan, is due to report back by April 25 next year.

Australia confirmed its first case of horse flu in a stallion at the Eastern Creek station in August.

More than 40,000 horses are still infected with equine influenza in Australia.

First witnesses front horse flu inquiry

Tuesday, 13/11/2007

An inquiry into the horse flu outbreak has heard the virus spread around the world as a result of horses being transported for breeding.

The first day of witness testimony has been held in Sydney.

Senior micro-biologist, Dr James Gilkerson from Melbourne University, told the inquiry the equine influenza virus turned up in Miama, Florida, 44 years ago, after infected horses were imported from South America.

Dr Gilkerson said the virus then moved rapidly across the United States, was transferred to Europe, and appeared in the UK in 1976 with the increasing air transport of horses for breeding.

He said the strain responsible for the current outbreak in Australia is most closely related to the US-Wisconsin 2003 strain.

Dr Gilkerson also described the highly infectious nature of the virus, saying with the exception of Natal province, every horse in South Africa was infected within three days in that country's 1986 outbreak.

The hearing continues.

NFF wants quarantine changes

Tuesday, 13/11/2007

The National Farmers Federation says confidence in the quarantine system has been destroyed by the horse flu outbreak.

It has been a long-time defender of the system, to the annoyance of some of its state members.

But NFF chief executive Ben Fargher says the group will push for changes after the election.

"We really want to make sure that the authorities have got the resources on-farm and obviously post-border as well to manage the quarantine system and with equine flu and other concerns there's no doubt there are many, many farmers that have a lack of confidence in the current scheme and it will be a challenge for whoever wins on the 24th to rebuild confidence in the scheme," he says.

Purple patch for runners at Randwick in December

THE return of Sydney racing at Randwick on December 1 would be open to all horses ready to compete, a meeting between Racing NSW officials and the state Department of Primary Industries determined yesterday.

Racing NSW chief Peter V'Landys said horses in the department's designated "green zones" which have been free of equine influenza would be allowed into "purple zones", though some restrictions would remain.

"Horses from green zones will be able to come to Sydney which is a purple zone and race as normal," V'Landys said. "But if the horses head back to the green zone after racing they will then have to be segregated from other horses for two weeks before they can be in contact again."

V'Landys said horses moved to Sydney from green zones could continue racing without any restrictions provided they stayed in the purple zone while the amber zone surrounding Kembla Grange would be treated as a purple zone as a test case to see if the vaccines were working.

"The DPI is treating the thoroughbred industry as an experiment to see that the vaccines are in fact working which in turn will allow over time the free movement of all horses in NSW," he said. "We would envisage that as of January 31 there will once again be a free movement policy of horses allowed in NSW."

V'Landys said it was thought there was little risk of EI spreading further "because all our horses have been vaccinated twice".

"The horses that have caught EI will be blood-tested at the expense of Racing NSW to ensure they have sufficient antibodies against the virus," he said. "These developments are an important step in the right direction to ensure this multibillion-dollar industry is back working again."

There will be barrier trials at Kembla Grange tomorrow and then at Randwick on Friday while Saturday's Wyong meeting has attracted 178 nominations.

The David Payne-trained Guillotine, a half-brother to Melbourne Cup winner Efficient, will be one of the 63 horses to trial at Randwick with Payne and Gai Waterhouse providing the bulk of the runners.

Neville Voigt (two), Pat Webster and Bruce Wallace (one each) will be the only other trainers to have runners at the session.

Meanwhile, the inquiry into the EI outbreak in Australia, first detected at Sydney's Eastern Creek quarantine station on August 23, begins today with retired High Court judge Ian Callinan heading proceedings.

Several witnesses, including three from the Australian Quarantine and Inspection Service, are expected to be called including Julie Sims, who is responsible for activities at Eastern Creek.

John Schell www.smh.com.au
November 13, 2007

Horse flu outbreak over by June: Chief Vet

Victoria's Chief Veterinarian says it is possible the horse industry could return to normal by June next year.

The industry has been subject to biosecurity protocols and transport restrictions since the horse flu outbreak in August.

Doctor Hugh Miller says there's been a decline in the number of horse flu cases in New South Wales and Queensland while Victoria remains free of the virus.

He says restrictions on the cross-border transportation of horses will be eased in the New Year and recreational events should also return to normal.

"The projections that are by June next year it ought to have been possible to have not only have the disease run its course, but the work that's required and it's a fair bit of work in Queensland and NSW to prove that the disease has indeed disappeared," he said.

Shetland pony's death 'not linked to EI'

The company behind the transportation of an Australian shetland pony says it is drawing too long a bow to suggest its death had any connection to the equine influenza (EI) outbreak.

The pony died of an unidentified respiratory disease in August after it was transported to the US by a company which was also transporting horses to Sydney's Eastern Creek Quarantine station at the time of the outbreak.
Adelaide Plains Equine Clinic spokesman Dr Elizabeth Woolsey Herbert says the pony could have been infected by equipment or staff involved in both deliveries.

She wants the Callinan Inquiry to look into the exact cause of the pony's death.

International Racing Transport group spokesman Quentin Wallace says there is nothing to suggest the death was linked to equine influenza.

$3000 Fines for Horses in Hiding

Liz Buchanan, Friday, 9 November 2007

Horse owners who failed to register their steeds could face fines of up to $3000, the Queensland Performance & Pleasure Horse Industry group warned today.

Under the Stock Act of 1915, horse owners throughout Queensland - regardless of their current Equine Influenza zoning - were legally required to register how many horses they had, and where they were housed, on the Department of Primary Industries & Fisheries website.

Failure to register would also restrict future movement permits as well as hamper applications for vaccination against Equine Influenza.
QPPHI chair Peter Toft said registration details were needed so that vaccination teams knew where the horses where, and which ones needed priority access to the modified, live canary pox vaccine to help stop the spread of EI.

Mr Toft said horse owners were also legally required to notify the DPI&F of new EI cases, to not only track the virus' movements but determine a property's EI status for future movement permits.

The call for registration comes as the QPPHI this week started rolling out the vaccines it secured to inoculate 26,000 performance and pleasure horses.

Mr Toft said while some of the vaccines would be used for welfare purposes, a large proportion of the vaccines would be used tactically, in densely populated equine areas to increase and reinforce the buffer zone and bring an end to EI.

Registration of horses statewide would also assist in immediate disease containment, should EI - or any other disease - jump the buffer zone.
"If we want to contain and eradicate EI we must know where the horses are in the red and green zones and beyond," Mr Toft said. "This will help us determine where the vaccines would be used most effectively to contain the virus and by doing that, get the industry back to work."

Mr Toft said Queensland horse owners should be acknowledged for their strict biosecurity measures, which had helped contain EI to the red zone for the past 10 weeks.

"But now is not the time to let our guard down," he said. "If we keep it in the red zone, horse movement restrictions will ease by Christmas and we will be on the path to recovery.

"If EI gets into the green zone however, the standstill will continue."
Horse owners can register their mounts online, over the telephone or in person at their local DPI&F office. For online registrations visit: www.dpi.qld.gov.au/equine-influenza or call 13 25 23.

Equine influenza daily update - 12 November 2007

5423 infected Properties (IPs); 453 Dangerous Contact Properties (DCPs); 516 Suspect Properties (SPs); 16,532 of 23,921 horses vaccinated; 6010 movement permits issued; 3242 quarantine orders issued; 4949 thermometers and information packages mailed.

Read more.

Lynch mentality not the answer

CONFIRMED cases of equine influenza (EI) at Darkes Forest and Helensburgh have ruined any chance of provincial harness racing returning at Bulli next month.

Some people were quick to blame a farrier who worked on various properties for spreading the virus. One reader even demanded retribution.
Although owners, trainers, drivers and many others who depend on the industry are having their finances stretched to the limit by the racing shutdown, vengeance is not the answer.

Peter Rixon, the owner-trainer-driver of Divisive, had hoped to start his four-time derby winner at Bulli on the way to resurrecting Victoria Cup and Inter Dominion campaigns in Melbourne.

Read more.