Not really apart from living on a farm with horses. 
I wasn’t even in the barn that much in the 6 days between labor and getting sick. We had a farm sitter, then when we got home my husband was handling the horse care.
All I can figure is that it’s probably part of the normal bacterial flora of my horses and home, but I was likely immunocompromised after delivery.
Did I miss a taxonomic reclassification here? (It wouldn’t surprise me.)
Last I recall, strangles was Strep.equi subspecies equi, the causative agent of strangles, and then there was Strep equi, subspecies zooepidemicus, which is an opportunistic pathogen (with less species-specificity).
@Ghazzu - I doubt it!! I probably just didn’t say it quite right!
But, as to what might be going on with Dune’s horses, any idea?
There are some case reports in the literature of S. equi zooepidemicus being the apparent culprit in upper respiratory outbreaks in horses.
Here’s one:
Lindahl, S. B., Aspán, A., Båverud, V., Paillot, R., Pringle, J., Rash, N. L., … Waller, A. S. (2013). Outbreak of upper respiratory disease in horses caused by Streptococcus equi subsp. zooepidemicus ST-24. Veterinary Microbiology, 166(1-2), 281–285. doi:10.1016/j.vetmic.2013.05.006
Sorry, tried to respond to your comment directly, but I’m not good with the new format. In any case, this is my concern, but I’m certainly no expert. Horse was scoped and guttural pouches looked fine, although I’m second guessing my decision to have the mobile vet do it in the field versus going to the clinic.
Not a live link, but looks interesting! Does it say how we get rid of it for good?!? That’s really what I’m looking for or, because my vets are like , who else can I involve that could help???
My one experience with this, the horse tested positive (once out of the five tests run), the vet freaked out and decided that he was an asymptomatic carrier, but I’m not sure there was anything obvious to see when the vet did the three penicillin gel treatments. Those did require scoping to find the area.
I’m still not convinced he had it, but I kind of had to go along with the program once the ball got rolling. It was an incidental finding on a respiratory panel run when the horse contracted flu (rhino?) from a horse that had just been released from quarantine by Jet Pets. With a cough. And it got dragged out longer than necessary when the vet initially contradicted what the standard treatment was, thereby delaying the start of treatment. I refer to the incident as “The Strangles Debacle.”
The paper cited was concerned entirely with the scientific aspects of the outbreak. No mention of how the cases were treated.
Well darn, it’s an interesting discussion, but I need this figured out.
Ugh, this is a debacle as well. I’m just not sure which part of the equation is the problem lol
By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. You may also receive promotional emails from The Chronicle of the Horse. You can opt out at any time.
For Customers
Company
Terms of Use
