Very premature foal

Horses donated for research are treated well & when to euth determined by the clinic, not by the deep-pockets owner.
I don’t believe KVS has a realistic view of QOL for this horse.
That, or she’s a clickhappy Influencer using him for views that = $$

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Well, that reddit thread will make for some interesting reading. I may have found my people! :+1:

Surely this vet realizes this experimental journey with Seven has come to an end. He’s growing, getting taller and heavier than expected. Those Frankenstein joints won’t be able to support him. Watching the video, as he stumbles around and fights to remain upright, it looks like he’s also got some nerve or neurological issues going on. I felt like at any moment he was going to tumble awkwardly and snap that fetlock. After all the torment this little creature has endured, I would be so saddened to have him die an excruciating death.

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I see, thanks for the explanation. I don’t have enough information to assume that the vets are acting unethically here; I assume that they aren’t influenced by the owner being able to afford all the care they are providing this horse. Perhaps if the horse was donated, they would make different decisions for financial reasons, but I don’t see any evidence that they feel that they are treating the horse unethically. I could certainly be wrong, so I’m not implying that my opinion is more valid than yours.

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It would take more evidence than we have, to know if the Vets were acting in a financially unethical manner and that’s not the point for most people here.

However that issue goes, I can’t imagine at this point in time that anyone, who knows anything about basic horse care and anatomy, is anything but disgusted with this experiment at this poor animal’s expense.

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I cannot imagine that young animal not being in pain as he knuckles over time and again. How that must feel. He is suffering.

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Not necessarily. Having dealt with more than my fair share of knuckled over/contracted tendon animals, what actually hurts is the physio (if warranted) to straighten them out.

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There is a new video of him meeting a mini.

One daughter just shared that link with me.

I’ve been hyper focused on the fragile LF but also wonder about the entire upright back end. If joints aren’t lining up normally wouldn’t that be a factory for arthritis which also occurs when the skeleton isn’t so compromised?

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Gretchen. I wll say Dr U mentioned the left front…and KVS seems more concerned about quality vs quantity of time…We’ll see.
He’s having another “procedure” on a hind this week? I feel like that was just “casually mentioned”.

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He never really puts weight on the l front. I just kinda shakes and buckles even when standing still. Now my next statement I will preface by saying I am not a breeder and have not been around any breeding operations but it seems like she has an awful large amount of foals from her small operation that end up hospitalized. Maybe it seems like a lot because those cases get more clicks so IDK

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Well that ship has sailed on the quality v quantity.

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Hmm. :thinking:

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I don’t want to give her social media more attention than it already has, so I only looked at one brief video. And I’m somewhat horrified. Horses have very limited options as far as laying down to rest, their bodies cannot physiologically tolerate laying down for long periods of time, so they are forced to stand even if it is uncomfortable or exhausting. They can neither whimper or cry out. They are intrinsically wired to “act fine” even when they are suffering. Comfort and quality of life decisions for horses are thus very difficult, but I don’t think it takes a vet to see that this is a concerning situation.

I think it is very dangerous to post about sick foals (or often even sick or injured adult horses) on social media. It complicates the decision making process if euthanasia is on the table. I didn’t read the comments, and again, I spent as little time on this person’s page as possible, but I think it is likely that there is a significant group of followers who are cheering at this person’s efforts to save this creature. Many people nowadays leverage their social media content into a following that leads to income, and it’s kind of an awful thought to think that a silently suffering animal is being used for that end. Even if this person isn’t doing that, I would ask, does it color her decision making to know that if she euthanizes the foal she will likely face social media backlash (even if euthanasia is clearly the correct decision)?

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Yes…I think that is exactly what has gone on. And now the Vet school is cashing in too. If they pull the plug…backlash will be monstrous for those non-horse person followers who think all this has been wonderful and uplifting :angry:. As creaky as he is on 3 of the 4 legs, I would guess some day when he gets up from laying down, something will catastrophically fail. He shouldn’t have gotten to this point but here he is.

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Yup :disappointed:
This is now a yearling who has never known a normal environment.
From birth his World has been the hospital.
He doesn’t know there’s any other Life.
But we do. & So should KVS.
I place blame for this SM Circus squarely on her.
If she’d had a shred of actual care for this foal or now the decency to back off posting her clickbait updates, I might have some regard for her as an owner/breeder.
But now it’s just sickening & needs to end.

All I saw on her SM - before Seven happened - was a spoiled Richkid throwing money at her menagerie & posting LookAtMe! vids.
It took a turn when this foal seemingly became only an experiment, the SM equivalent of a Freakshow.
The only outcome I see is proving how long they can High Tech duct tape/baling twine this baby together before the inevitable Crash & Burn end.

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Euthanasia is hard enough for anyone with pets. It should never be based on popular vote from afar. It’s unethical to monetize a suffering animal.

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I disagree that she shoulders the full culpability here. Dr Ursini has defended this repeatedly and advocated that he has good quality of life. I think this is a case to an extent of a vet who needs someone to give them a reality check that just because for perhaps the first time in their career, they have unlimited resources to treat a patient, doesn’t mean that they can really fix things given that access or that it’s a worthy goal. I see this often in younger vets where they think the standard of care is to do everything possible, and only to back down if the money doesn’t exist, but that doing so is compromising care and their duty to their patients. Older vets I think see the allocation of resources as part of determining what the best practice. In the last 50 years, how we view animals and what we owe them as their caretakers has changed considerably, I believe. If you told James Herriot that one day vets would be posting on TikTok about how emotionally devastating it is to euthanize a dog because their owners didn’t get health insurance and couldn’t afford an MRI and neurosurgery, he would have likely called them insane. Kind of simultaneous to the expansion of what vets CAN do has been a huge expansion in what they feel we are obligated to do. Like everything, I think the truth is somewhere in the middle, but I do wish that someone at UT would have a conversation about the ethics here.

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Is there a link to the newest video?

The most recent I see is from 1/8…(And that’s bad enough!)

Last video is January 26 and there’s a pic from yesterday.

Pretend I’m a moron :woman_facepalming:, so could you link me?

TIA!