Streptococcus equi subspecies zooepidemica AND now strangles//update March '21

[Obsidian_Fire]

ETA: We now have at least one confirmed case of strangles, on top of this other. Still waiting on one other culture but suspect it will be strangles too.
Good lord. How long does our farm need to be in quarantine? Is it from date of diagnosis/symptoms of most recent horse?
Anybody know more than I do…? TIA.

This is not the same as strangles which is subspecies equi. My question is, has anyone out here dealt with this? Do you know how your animals got it? Human risk? How long did it take to “go away” (please already! ) completely - as in weeks later it wasn’t still cropping up?
I’ve read a bit via google, but I’d really like to hear from those who’ve actually dealt with this.

@Ghazzu - if you have time would you weigh in on this? Thank you!

@Dune - you asked for an update. In the end, this went through our barn 2/3 horses at a time. It “got” the little mare who is my mare’s companion, so my mare got it too. It was about 3-ish weeks of twice daily temperature checks, bute am/pm, and a whole lot of feeling very helpless as there really wasn’t much I could do!
There were 2 different vet clinics involved. One clinic went the antibiotics route. My vet did not. He felt it was better to let it run its course. Some horses got very minor symptoms, others were quite ill, with the classical abscess under the jaw, etc.
In the end only 2 horses did not get any signs at all, so we “assume” they never got it. One older mare, ended up dying altho it wasn’t strangles that killed her, it just sped things along (she had kidney failure). With my mare, she first had symptoms late November, I think it was after Christmas before I quit taking her temp twice a day, and it was mid January before she quit coughing and I felt like I could do some work with her - walking on the lunge, for about 15 minutes only, 3 days a week. She’s a strong healthy 10 y/o who had been in full work prior, so she did bounce back and now she’s fine.
Did you have any specific questions?

[Ghazzu]

It is a potentially zoonotic Strep. It’s also fairly ubiquitous, but more of an opportunistic pathogen than a highly infectious one.

[mbv]

Strep zoo is normal flora on mucosal surfaces in horses. It is an opportunist and can definitely cause a wide variety of infections; the site of infection will largely dictate the treatment options and time to resolution. It is a bacteria that can cause disease in humans, but people can get it from a totally healthy horse, not just from a horse that is currently sick with Strep zoo.

[Obsidian_Fire]

@Ghazzu. At our barn it’s been making the rounds quite viciously. So far it’s been upper respiratory; with fevers, sore throats, swollen lymph nodes that in some have burst, and a whole lot of very snotty noses. This started when we returned from fire evacuation, one horse seems to have “started” it, we got thru that first batch, everything seemed normal and now there’s another wave going around. There are maybe 5 horses who have not gotten anything (we hope it stays that way).
Is this just something that’s going to have to go around until it burns itself out?

[Ghazzu]

Hard to say. Strep zoo so rarely presents like this, so I’ve had no personal experience with such an outbreak. A quick peek at the literature shows that it’s unusual enough that a similar outbreak merited publication:
Veterinary Microbiology
Volume 166, Issues 1–2, 27 September 2013, Pages 281-285

How was the ID confirmed? Nasal swabs or cultured from abscesses? Was it typed as far as strain?

[Obsidian_Fire]

@Ghazzu I appreciate your responses. Thank you.

ID was confirmed both nasal and abscess culture, only thing I know as far as strain is ‘zooepidemicus’ vs. equi equi. We are still waiting on culture results from one other vet.

I admit to a whole lot of curiosity regarding this, it is rather uncommon. Even our vets were stumped until the cultures came back.

[PeteyPie]

This is so interesting.

I wonder if there could be some other infectious thing, like a virus, that sickened the horses in such a way that gave the bacteria a special opportunity.

@Obsidian_Fire, where are you located? Along those lines, has anyone read whether the new system will be putting our locations back on with our online names? That was so handy.

[Obsidian_Fire]

@PeteyPie I am in Oregon. And, nothing would surprise me as to how this got started. When we all evacuated, horses were thrown into groups and close quarters from all over the place. Things that would never normally happen. There’s bound to be “something” come from a situation like that. But we’ve been back home for a solid 8 weeks now and this is still not under containment at my barn.
What I find interesting is that with one exception, the horses who have not gotten sick are ones who’s owners vaccinate regularly and those same horses have done some traveling in some form - shows, lessons, trails, whatever. Even tho there is not a vaccine for this, I wonder if just the fact that we do it “teaches” the immune system to have a stronger response to anything foreign. Now, I say that while I am knocking wood real hard, because I’m sure somebody will make a liar outta me!

[BroncoMo]

For what it’s worth, take the following with a grain of salt as it is strictly correlation, and zero testing to confirm. Several years ago my sister moved her horses to my place in the middle of the night due to an urgent situation where she needed to get them off the place she was leasing. She then left town the next day for work and sent me a text “oh by the way, they may have been exposed to strangles”. A neighbor who shared a fence line had a horse with strangles. I went out and looked in the morning, and sure as s***, one mare had some snot and a ruptured abscess under her throat.

I’m not exactly set up to quarantine so I put her horses downwind with no fence line neighbors and let it play out; mine were vaccinated and vets suggested letting it run its course. I fed the contaminated paddock last and washed/sanitized afterwards. I can’t remember the exact number of days but I came down with strep, which I swear I got it from that one mare. I had never had strep, nor have I had it since. The correlation was simply too odd and coincidental for me to believe that I just randomly picked it up elsewhere.

I’ve had vets tell me it’s not possible and with schooling, I have a greater understanding of epidemiology and pathogenicity. But I have always maintained I got strep from a horse with strangles. Doesn’t help you much in the fact that it is lingering for so long; that was a one-and-done and neither myself nor any horses here have had it since.

[TKR]

When I was in my teens and boarding and riding at a little “cowboy” barn. The owners were friends with an owner of a stockyard and horses came in from all over the country that came through the sale barn. Some came to our barn to be sold and often strangles was a problem. I’m not clear if there was a vaccination program for the regular boarders or not - in the 60’s - so not sure what was available. We treated with antibiotics and isolated. But it was relatively common and called “shipping fever”. I have always vaccinated for strangles even thought many do not knowing that so many horses shipping around can pick it up and transfer it, even though my barn has little to no traffic and mine don’t go alot either. But with my broodies especially and foals up to 3 years old, I’ve felt it was very important as my vet does. I use the IM method as it is more effective than the nasal IMO.

[Dune]

At the beginning of this year, we had about 10 pasture horses get “snotty nose/ cough/NO fever or lethargy” that were sharing fence lines. No one except one was treated with antibiotics. 2 1/2 months later, after SMZS/3 Excede injections/decent bloodwork/negative Amyloid test said horse still coughing/ runny nose. Vets were thinking allergies or RAD, so recommended moving to another barn. Did the scope, culture showed Strep Zoo. Hmmm ok, but Excede should have knocked it out. NOW for the kicker: 2 horses at the new barn (12 days later)
have snotty nose/cough. What the heck is going on?!?

[Peggy]

@Dune Chronic asymptomatic carrier?

It gets in the guttural pouches which are not reachable with normally administered antibiotics. Vet has to apply treatment to the guttural pouches to get rid of it.

Strangles: Identifying the chronic shedder

[Texarkana]

Fun fact: I was in the hospital for 3 days with a strep zoo infection shortly after I gave birth in March 2020.

They didn’t know why was wrong with me until the cultures came back. My doctor was shocked… but when I saw the results all I could do was .

[Obsidian_Fire]

That is why my vet prefers not to use antibiotics for strangles. Something about you have to get the timing exactly right or you can make things worse.
If your tests are coming back negative then…? Bastard strangles?

[Dune]

“Bastard strangles”, that’s what I’m wondering, but so far… cannot get vets to agree. Not sure what to do from here??? I feel TERRIBLE about the newly infected horses, but …???

[Dune]

Aaaargh, any idea as to how you got it???

[Dune]

My thought as well but can’t get Veteranarian to agree just yet. I would LOVE for it to just be coincidental, but I’ve seen the same symptoms too many times now to be so naive, unfortunately…

[Obsidian_Fire]

Unfortunately I believe each horse must be tested in order to “be certain” they all have strangles. But, IMO, if it looks like a duck, and walks like a duck…

[Dune]

It’s quacking like crazy. I just don’t know how a horse is still infectious 2 1/2 months later and why it won’t culture as such. They’ve started the infected horses in SMZs, I hope that’s not a mistake.

[Obsidian_Fire]

There is strep zoo, and there is strep zoo spp equis equis - which is strangles. So, testing positive for s. zoo, did they test further to see which subspecies? Do you have a university you could reach out to for questioning? Maybe they have some thoughts? Sounds like you need “deeper” testing, and maybe another round of Excede?