EHV at Thermal?

[Demerara_Stables]

Ok, fair. I had heard of them before this outbreak (and now am sadly much more familiar).

From my perspective, they seem to be doing a shit job informing people about this.

[Peggy]

@Demerara_Stables

Fuuuuuuu

Seriously?!

For sure. Like seriously.

CDFA has this helpful list of reportable diseases.

Also an EHM factsheet.

All linked from the page where the cases are reported. The cases are in a separate box that scrolls but you can also scroll down the entire page for more info.

A seriously helpful agency.

[Peggy]

@Demerara_Stables

Ok, fair. I had heard of them before this outbreak (and now am sadly much more familiar).

From my perspective, they seem to be doing a shit job informing people about this.

They’re approach is more pull than push for sure.

I was taught to Google EHV CDFA any time I heard a rumor of a case. Or as a daily routine during certain times of year. But this is at least my fourth or fifth rodeo.

[Jealoushe]

@Relative_Ease

What’s worse is that at least one social media commenter, apparently from a lockdown barn (not necessarily positive cases, but barn is locked down), wants to go to the ride if they can find a place to quarantine for two weeks afterwards. SMDH

omg please no…that is too much.

[leheath]

@Relative_Ease

What’s worse is that at least one social media commenter, apparently from a lockdown barn (not necessarily positive cases, but barn is locked down), wants to go to the ride if they can find a place to quarantine for two weeks afterwards. SMDH These sorts of attitudes make me that much more determined to stay home with my horse (and that much more cynical about people).

Wow…just wow…and this is how we will end up losing our whole show season…there are so many huge barns down here that have horses/riders from multiple disciplines…

[Sticky_Situation]

From an infection control perspective, what sense does it make to have EHM be reportable, while the causative agent — EHV1 — is not? A horse with EHV1 that doesn’t develop EHM can still pass the infection on, and that next horse is at risk to develop EHM, correct??

That’s like keeping track of AIDS, but not HIV infections. Sure, not all patients with HIV develop AIDS, but they can still pass it on to another person as long as they have a detectable viral load.

[hoopoe]

Because, for the most part, EHV is ubiquitous in Horses

[Demerara_Stables]

@Sticky_Situation

From an infection control perspective, what sense does it make to have EHM be reportable, while the causative agent — EHV1 — is not? A horse with EHV1 that doesn’t develop EHM can still pass the infection on, and that next horse is at risk to develop EHM, correct??

That’s like keeping track of AIDS, but not HIV infections. Sure, not all patients with HIV develop AIDS, but they can still pass it on to another person as long as they have a detectable viral load.

This.

[Demerara_Stables]

From the CDFA document you linked, EHV-1 is required to be reported within 30 days of discovery.

Completely unhelpful in this situation.

[Demerara_Stables]

Is there any evidence that EHM causes more EHM cases than EHV-1 does?

[Peggy]

Reporting EHV-1 within 30 days is useless so it’s effectively non-reportable. EHM is reportable within 2 days so actually useful. Somewhat.

[Demerara_Stables]

So the next question that follows, is whose email/phone do we need to blow up to change this in California?

[hillary_again]

The reporting requirements do differ by state. I think the document for California has been linked already. The EHV-1 reporting for CA is different than AZ (and IDK about other states).
For Arizona, these are the “Emergency Conditions - Report Within 4 Hours”:
https://agriculture.az.gov/animals/state-veterinarians-office/reportable-diseases
EQUINE
African horse sickness Dourine (Trypanosoma equiperdum) Enterovirus encephalomyelitisEquine infectious anaemiaEquine Neurologic Diseases (Eastern, Western, Venezuelan, West Nile Virus, Equine Herpes Virus-1/Equine Herpes Virus Myeloencephalopathy)Glanders (Burkholderia mallei) Hendra virus (Equine morbillivirus) Venezuelan equine encephalomyelitis

[Zevida]

EHV1 has to be reported to the state vet but it is not reported publicly and there is no quarantine unless there is a neurological case (EHM). So yes there are probably a lot more cases than you know; but that’s also probably true all the time.

This is a good FAQ Davis shared today:

10 Things You Might Not Know About Equine Herpesvirus-1 (EHV) and Equine...

[Demerara_Stables]

Sorry, was specifically referring to California. I have edited my post to reflect that.

[MHM]

For sure, I would not know any of those reporting requirements for my state off the top of my head. But I would certainly hope that any vet who is treating my horse would know them.

[horsegurl]

No doubt veterinarians or the state are dropping the ball here, but it does take several days to get to the state vet and then to get to the IT department for the CDFA a site to post it. I sent a mail to cdfa because I heard last week there was a posi-EHV1 @ Sonoma Horse Park-horse who lives there, and had been at Northern winter Classics but not at thermal. I asked why that had not appeared on their information yet and if they had the information. Will see if they respond. And also, we’re now a few days past the first 7-Day mark for the retest of the horse at Northern winter Classics who was positive. But that information hasn’t been posted either. So cdfa has a lot of catching up to do!

[Peggy]

I dredged up my EHV folder with notes from meetings 15 years ago with our local vet and also at Santa Anita with a group that included people from UCD and CHRB.

The effective non-reportability came up and some things that were noted:

1. At what point do you report? Fever? Respiratory signs? Positive test? Noting that some 2-5% of “normal” horses will test.
2. Economic impact of reporting and aftermath. Apparently $$$ from shut down > $$$ from horse death. These are my notes, not my opinion.

One of the people at the Santa Anita meeting actually said something to the effect of “be careful what you ask for” with respect to mandatory reporting (edited to change testing to reporting at 1:29 pm PST).

[Demerara_Stables]

Honestly, in 2022, in California, home of silicon valley, that’s a shit excuse (taking too long to get to IT and to be posted).

I have also heard of positive cases in San Mateo county that have yet to be posted. I also have emailed CDFA.

[Demerara_Stables]

I think you hit the nail on the head, when you mention the economic impact.

While I do understand (and most people should understand) that ehv is common in horses, we also are in an outbreak, and clearly the number of symptomatic cases have increased in past weeks. Now, whether that is due to an actual increase of symptomatic horses or simply an increase in people being vigilant of temperatures and increased testing, we may never know.

What we do know, is that lack of reporting and lack of people following proper procedure has spread this outbreak much farther than it should have gone. I think the cdfa needs to have a real post-mortem and really consider what their reporting requirements should be in the future.