Very happy about Alexander Tango!
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Bad news.....
Sydney Morning Herald.....
Flu cripples Sydney races
Craig Young and Paul Bibby
August 25, 2007
AUSTRALIA'S multi-billion-dollar horse racing industry is in meltdown with an outbreak of equine influenza spreading to Centennial Park, prompting the almost certain cancellation of today's meeting at Royal Randwick and casting a cloud over the spring carnival.
Racing officials announced early today that horses from the Centennial Park stables had returned positive tests to the highly contagious disease. This came within days of 52 horses being locked down at the Eastern Creek quarantine centre.
Most of those impounded at Eastern Creek are thoroughbred stallions worth about $500 million. They were due to begin serving some of the 30,000 mares registered in Australia when the breeding season starts on September 1.
The impact on the breeding program, combined with the effect on the racing calendar, would push the cost of a flu outbreak into the billions of dollars.
The first big casualty is today's feature meeting at Royal Randwick, which is next to Centennial Park. The meeting is set to be cancelled after racing officials meet at 6am today. No horses are allowed within five kilometres of the course.
"We will have to send security guards into Randwick to ensure none of the 600-odd horses stabled there are moved," said the chief executive of Racing NSW, Peter V'Landys.
The ramifications could be felt Australia-wide. The NSW Minister for Primary Industries, Ian Macdonald, met Mr V'Landys last night before the test results from the Centennial Park horses were known. The Herald understands the eminent veterinary professor Dave Hutchins had alerted Mr Macdonald's department yesterday to concerns about recreational horses at the stables.
Mr Macdonald immediately contacted the state's chief veterinary officer, Bruce Christie, who in turn sent a team to the stables to carry out tests.
Horses competing in the harness meeting at Harold Park last night were also tested, and their owners asked to place their animals in voluntary quarantine until they were notified of preliminary results.
The federal Agricultural Minister, Peter McGauran, said the suspected diagnosis of equine flu in a quarantined stallion was the biggest risk ever faced by the thoroughbred industry.
"A number of these stallions are between $100,000 and $200,000 per serve, so you can quickly do the arithmetic and see that millions of dollars are being lost. [But] it would be infinitesimal compared to the long-term effects if [the flu] was to escape into the wider horse population."
The stallion at the centre of the scare is believed to be Encosta De Lago, which is quarantined at Eastern Creek.
Encosta De Lago had been booked to service the three-time Melbourne Cup winner Makybe Diva next month.
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