Some people are wildly opposed to euthanasia, particularly of what they believe is a healthy horse, and there will be those who absolutely believe the family should bankrupt themselves to send horse back to Europe and pay for training and selling.
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Import requirements from Canada to USA for permanent residence in USA:
*Horses from Canada who have been in Canada less than 60 days must be accompanied by an original copy of export health certificate from country of origin. If original is not available, a copy endorsed by Canadian government veterinary officials is acceptable. In addition, they must be accompanied by certification from Canadian government veterinary officials that the horses have been tested for dourine, glanders equine infectious anemia, piroplasmosis, and have been released from quarantine. Import testing requirements for Contagious Equine Metritis (CEM) if required have been met in Canada, and the horse should be accompanied by documentation certifying to the testing. The official export health certificate statements in i. – v. above will certify the horses for the time period they have been in Canada.
You also need the usual permit if horse comes across by air. Above is allowed for trucking. Presumably, if the Canadian government allowed entry on a horse with a 1/5 CFT and it had the appropriate paperwork, then it does seem that it would be allowed entry into the US. In the case of this particular horse, it took weeks for the CFT to go down to 1, so not sure that would have been a lot more helpful. I don’t know much about the quarantine operations in Canada.
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Thanks.
It does sound like the horse would have gotten out of quarantine by this time if it had come via Canada. So they still would have had a whopping import bill due to the extra weeks waiting on the test, but at least it would be for a live horse in North America, which seems far superior to their current situation.
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Aaah. I understand now. I’m failing to recognize the obvious.
Thanks for an explanation regarding Canada. Your posts have really helped spell out import rules in a way that’s easier for me to grasp.
I used a lab in Germany. Like this family, I had no reason to think that the CFT there would give a different result than the CFT here. And looking at some of the studies and percentages, it is still highly unlikely. I suppose I could have asked my vet over there to send the blood anywhere.
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I hope someone more knowledgeable will correct me if I am wrong here, but my understanding with the Glanders test in Canada is that the CFT needs to be negative at a 1/5 dilution (i.e. still 0) - not that a horse can score a one and be released.
Another question for the science related professionals who are following this thread, and helping educate others…
Are there any documented cases of false negatives on the Western Blot for glanders? Obviously there are false positives with the CFT for it. Not a high rate… but it’s a known issue.
What about Western Blot tests with respect to other diseases? Are there any specific diseases which come to mind when it was discovered after a certain amount of time/certain sample size of tests that the Western Blot Test did actually sometimes result in false negatives?
I’m asking because I have seen many folks on Facebook and some here state with ABSOLUTE certainty that BECAUSE of all of his negative Western Blot tests, it is CERTAIN the horse doesn’t have Glanders. And that because we SOMETIMES get a false positive rate of 3% (?) or higher with respect to the North American CFT, the USDA should DEFINITELY change its procedures and switch to using the Western Blot tests instead.
Last question… glanders is a bacterial disease (if I understand it correctly). Is it possible for the bacteria to mutate SLIGHTLY, and cause a situation like we have here… a positive CFT and a negative Western Blot? When it comes to the topic of genetic mutations, I am much more knowledgeable about oncology and humans. And it’s a COMPLICATED thing in medicine with a ton of issues related to “mutations of unknown significance.” Anyway… I assume bacteria can mutate slightly over time. And maybe that would imps t test results? Maybe I’m off base though, and this disease and bacteria are just totally unlikely to mutate and impact widely used tests in any meaningful way.
That’s probably the correct reading of their rule! It doesn’t say “dilution” anywhere, so that confused me. But considering that 1 is still not “positive” in the US but “suspect”, that’s also confusing.
I don’t have first-hand knowledge, but very few tests have no false negatives, so I did a quick search and found a relevant study from 2019: “Evaluation of the comparative accuracy of the complement fixation test, Western blot and five enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays for serodiagnosis of glanders” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30951554
To summarize: This study took blood from 142 equids with positve culture or PCR for glanders and tested them by several different methods, including CFT and Western Blot. Five of them were negative by Western Blot and two were negative by CFT. They also had blood from 112 equids diagnosed by clinical signs of glanders: 3 were negative by Western Blot and 3 were negative by CFT.
They also took blood from 2,959 equids without glanders. Eighteen were positive by Western Blot and 108 were positive by CFT.
Looking only at this study, they calculated a sensitivity (correctly identifying positive animals) of 98.0 for the CFT and 96.8 for the Western Blot, and a specificity (correctly identifying negative animals) of 96.4 for CFT and 99.4 for the Western Blot.
This study stated: “The CFT is the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) prescribed serodiagnostic method for international trade purposes and is also recommended for surveillance investigations [7]. This test is known to have high sensitivity, but it gives a considerable number of false-positive results [8, 9]. These false-positive results cause unnecessary restrictions on international trade of animals and products thereof and result in financial losses for owners and the horse industry”
…
“However, taking into account the performance characteristics of assays based on the pre-determined cut off values used in this study, replacement of the CFT with the WB or any of the ELISAs cannot be recommended for testing equids for trade yet.”
So yeah, it’s possible for the Western Blot to give a false negative - which is exactly why it’s not used in these foreign animal disease import cases. You have to err on the side of minimizing false negative results (even though the CFT also can have false negatives!) at the expense of false positives. Good policy to prevent introduction of foreign animal diseases, bad policy for the animals and owners that have false positives.
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It’s really not clearly written. I just assumed that was what they meant, because, I think negative at a 1:5 dilution is the OIE standard.
There doesn’t appear to be any more specific information regarding the Canadian testing protocol online.
ETA: I also could not find any info regarding what ‘an alternative test acceptable to CFIA’ would be either. So it’s not clear to me whether Canada would accept a negative WB in lieu of a negative CFT for Glanders.
Thanks for the heads up - didn’t cross my mind. Link deleted.
BUT if one tested a horse on the 23rd, should they have the result by now? Even if two weekend days included?
please re- read the Discussion section. This study had results that differ from others. Fair but not definitive. it also goes in to a long section on how complicated the tests can be, and incubation period can affect the tests. A positive CFT, negative WB and negative ELISA still is not a definitive positive.
from the same article:
found. Based on all 3,000-tested serum samples in this study, it was shown, that the five ELISAs and the WB were more specific than the CFT. Previously published reports showed the utility of ELISA techniques regarding the improvement of specificity in comparison to CFT. The specificity of ELISA using either recombinant BimA antigen or TssB protein were 98.9% and 100%, respectively [14, 18]. The WB was previously shown to have a specificity of 100% [9]. Another study showed the IDVet-ELISA to have excellent specificity (98.9%) in a preliminary validation [22]. However, the estimates were based on lower sample numbers than considered adequate by OIE.
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Yes. Laboratories are required to keep QC records that have the lot number, date received, date open and date of expiration. Depending on the test, you are required to do QC, external (QC from a different company) and internal (QC that comes with the kit) each time you run the test. You have to run QC each time you put the kit to use. Some require you just to run QC once a week or month, but all kits are required when opened unless they are the same lot number in the same shipment. Some tests require the QC to be run each test.
Each test MUST be run per instructions and personal must be trained and signed off. Each year, they have a competency test to check if they run the test correctly. This is also kept on record.
It’s important to store the kits at the Correct temperature as stated by the manufacturer. The test also must be run at the correct temperature per manufacturers instructions. That means there needs to be records of temperature of both the refrigerator ( if the kits and controls need to be refrigerated) and ambient temperature. If the tech runs the test while the kit is cold, it will give false results. Same if it’s too hot.
Lastly, the sample must be collected in the correct collection tube, kept at a stable temperature and brought to the lab within the time allowed per the kit instructions.
You wouldn’t believe how many vets and testing techs don’t follow instructions and give false results.
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[USER][/USER]
Thank you both for your responses to my specific questions. I will admit that I am waaaaayyyyy out of my comfort zone on many of the science related issues with this whole case, but I do understand both of your responses to my specific questions, and appreciate the education.
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Well, there is no activity on the GFM or clarity there as to what is going on with the horse… but there is FB activity on the trainers page with a comment from
the owner. She addresses the possibility of them signing the horse over to Jet Pets.
Anyone curious can read it for themself and decide what to make of it. All I think I will say, is that it seems quite clear that the horse has not been euthanized as of this evening.
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That would stink for the owner. A lot, a lot, a lot. But maybe in the scenario she describes the horse might survive this whole misadventure.
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I am going to preface this with the info that I was in h/j pre-warmblood (ottb, rest for a month or so, train, show, sell…rinse, repeat)
can someone clarify if the horse goes back, why does the seller not take it back?
Thx
I’m just giving my personal opinion on this, but the seller does not take the horse back because the seller has no obligation to take the horse back.
Some posters have commented that they were able to talk the seller of their horse(s) into some sort of contractual clause about import/disease testing. That was not the case here.
If I were a seller, as in a business, what do I have to gain by taking this horse back?
Yes, it would possibly “look good” from a customer service stand point, but how would it benefit my pockets? How would I sell a horse that was imported to America and returned for testing positive for Glanders? There is little motivation for a finanically driven seller to take this horse back.
If the horse does have Glanders or any other infectious disease, the horse should be euthanized, not exported, unless the disease can be otherwise eliminated via treatment of some sort.
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@Virginia Horse Mom , I need to clarify timing. Horses in Spain are first tested for Piro before purchase. Because why buy a horse you cannot export? Often at buyer’s expense. For that, I used the German lab, as IPEsq said. Once purchased ,the shipper picks it up and takes it to his quarantine barn. There, the horse is retested for Piro and the other diseases. At this point, my shipper insisted on using the U.S. lab because that is the lab that would have to pass this horse in the U.S… The Horse did belong to me at this point,but if he had tested positive in the U.S.,it would be far far easier to resell him in Spain. The horse was insured so if he had tested positive for Glanders, would he have been euthanized? I don’t know that answer.
Anyway, hindsight is 20:20. I am absolutely grateful to that shipper and would say all shippers should at least mention this option.
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I read that post as them simply answering the question given (what happens if they simply walk away from the horse now). It is well written and explains things well (what would happen if they turned the horse over to JetPets).
I do agree that it does seem to make the point that the horse is still alive at this point.
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