Keeneland Barn Released From Strangles Quarantine

The Kentucky Department of Agriculture issued an update regarding cases of strangles in racehorses in Central Kentucky.

Strangles is a highly contagious bacterial infection of the equine upper respiratory tract that can be spread by horse-to-horse contact or by humans, tack, buckets, and other environmental factors.

Symptoms can include fever, nasal discharge, cough, and swollen lymph nodes. Some horses only show mild symptoms, but can still prove contagious.

Full recovery of uncomplicated cases of strangles is favorable but usually takes three to six weeks.

KY Strangles Epidemiologic Investigation Update—April 25

Premises 2: The 15 horses under the care of the two individual trainers remaining in the barn at Keeneland were all sampled April 24. Results of the Polymerase Chain Reaction tests have been released, with each animal found and reported to be negative.

Based on the following facts:

The population of horses stabled in this barn have all now tested negative on two separate occasions.

Through investigation, we identified no direct exposure to the horses under the care of the single trainer with positive horses on any of the three premises.

Our earlier testing provided evidence that the disease-causing organism was not circulating in the Keeneland barn at the time the horses under the care of the single trainer were moved offsite.

The group of remaining horses have been under close health monitoring and scrutiny the past eight days with no fevers or other signs of illness detected.

Each individual horse was evaluated earlier April 25 with no abnormal findings.

The information and findings described above provide us the evidence needed to confidently release the previously imposed quarantine barn at Keeneland this evening and allow the trainers in Barn 7 to resume their normal daily operations effective immediately.  Horses residing in Barn 7 are no longer under regulatory restriction and will resume their normal training activity tomorrow morning at Keeneland.

We will continue to closely monitor the health of these horses daily, requiring daily reports be made to Keeneland's vice president of Equine Safety, Dr. Stuart Brown, and Rusty Ford, equine operations consultant with the Department of Agriculture's office state veterinarian.

Additional Information:

Premises 1: The population of horses residing in the affected barn at The Thoroughbred Center were all sampled Monday with negative results returned. Following our protocol established for handling horses under the care of a single trainer, and identified as having potential direct exposure, these horses will be resampled a third time, with the test including examination and flushing of the guttural pouches. The horses under the care of the second trainer in this same barn will also be sampled a third time.

Premises 3: The population of horses residing in the affected barn at Triple Diamonds Training Center (aka Three Diamonds) were collected earlier April 25 with results pending. 

Private Quarantine: All horses moved from the single trainer's affected barns on Premises 1, 2 and 3, do remain under quarantine on a private facility. Prior to releasing these horses, each horse will be sampled on three separate occasions with all horses in the group reported negative. Testing of the horses under the care of the single trainer will include endoscopic examination and flushing of the guttural pouches.