Make no mistake, EIA is a deadly disease that kills horses and which has no cure or treatment. This correspondent has personally lost a valuable two-year-old back in January 1990, which had to be destroyed in Tohana, Haryana, after testing positive for EIA. So there is no question of the writer’s minimizing or in any way trivializing the threat posed by this disease.
At the same time, one has to speculate: what is the fuss about? Once EIA entered India around 1987, it has never left and probably never will. The Indian Turf has to manage the disease, not necessarily eradicate it. Kentucky had over 50 positive reactors annually in the mid-eighties (source: AAEP Newsletter quoted in Ontario Ministry of Food & Agriculture Fact Sheet) and at least 2 as recently as 2003 (source: APHIS, USDA). That has not stopped, slowed or hindered the state’s multi-billion dollar trade in horses. Why are we getting so excited about two positive reactors in riding horses, which in all probability harboured the disease for years and were detected only because they had to travel to Delhi in connection with the Republic Day celebrations?
Let us examine the past developments in India. During the ‘seventies, the National Horse Breeding Society of India requested the Ministry of Agriculture of the Govt. of India to make the Coggins test mandatory for all imports of equines. This writer was advised that several communications were addressed on this score.
Despite this, no such requirement was posted until -- about twenty years ago – the dreaded virus entered India, presumably from an import from Canada that had not been through a sale (all sale horses are compulsorily tested for EIA). Then, closing the stable door after the horse had bolted, the Ministry of Agriculture finally incorporated EIA testing as one of the conditions attached to the import licences issued by the Ministry of Commerce.
The first clinical signs of the disease were noticed in three stables at the Bangalore Racecourse in the second half of 1986. One of these stables was run by then trainer Shivendra Singh, whose family owned the Doaba Stud near Aligarh in Uttar Pradesh. Some of his racehorses displayed lack of appetite, developed fever after workouts, and passed coffee-coloured urine. Over cups of steaming hot tea one late-October morning that year, Shivendra Singh, his family members, and the writer sat in the verandah of Doaba Stud and discussed the problem with the renowned international veterinarian, Dr. Peter Rossdale, then on a visit to the country.
“Sounds like EIA” said Dr. Rossdale. “Impossible” was the writer’s naïve response – “there is no EIA in India”. Wishful thinking!
Anyway, it was decided that upon his return to England, Dr. Rossdale would obtain official permission to import serum samples from the affected horses and to have them tested at the Central Veterinary Laboratory in Weybridge, Surrey. This was done during November 1986. At the end of that month, the writer visited Dr. Rossdale in person at his surgery on the High Street in Newmarket and was perhaps the first Indian to hear the chilling news: “The tests were positive for EIA”.
So the cat was out of the bag. How the disease spread in India (it’s 99.99% certain that the primary route of infection was through improperly sterilized needles, as disposables were not in general use); how several of those affected went into denial; how the frail egos of some veterinarians prevented proper diagnosis and management of the “mystery” disease at the time; how hundreds of horses had to be put down at Calcutta Race Course – these are all part of Indian racing history and need not be dealt with here.
What does need mention is the fact that the Ministry of Agriculture decided to make the then newly-established National Research Centre on Equines, at Hissar, Haryana, the focal point for testing for EIA. In March 1987, this writer visited Hissar, witnessed Dr. M.P. Yadav carrying out the Coggins test and was convinced that (a) the “mystery” disease was indeed EIA, and (b) that Dr. Yadav was perfectly competent to carry out the testing.
One lacuna at that time was that all tests had to be sent only to Hissar. In a country the size of India this proved cumbersome and led to delays. The Coggins test is not rocket science and can be performed by any trained microbiologist or pathologist in an environment-controlled laboratory. Hence there was no logic in concentrating testing facilities to one location.
Failure to quickly establish regional testing facilities in India certainly contributed to the delay in controlling the disease. It took months if not years for the Government of India to approve the P3 Laboratory set up by the RWITC Ltd. at Pune. Even now this lab. runs only when a particular individual is available i.e. there is no testing “on-demand” round the year.
Exploiting the fact that horse racing is a high stakes game, the EIA charges have been raised to Rs.1,000 per test for individuals sending just the odd sample from time to time. These usurious charges – and the fuss made about who draws the samples and what the identity of the horse is, etc. – have made EIA into the proverbial political hot potato. It’s little known but true that the Ministry of Agriculture will not accept the results of EIA testing carried out by OIE-approved labs, like the CVL in England and the NVSL is the USA and insists on retesting all imported horses!
Gradually, as testing of Thoroughbreds in India became widespread and compulsory, and disposable syringes and needles became de rigueur the disease came under control. Apart from one stud farm in the North which irresponsibly established a separate unit to board EIA-affected horses (ticking time-bombs), all others “bit the bullet” and put down their positive reactors. It may be mere speculation, but could there be some link between the two horses affected in the current problem and those that were once boarded and/or bred at what the local populace called the “EIA Pharum”?
In the last five years or so, only one positive case was officially reported as far as this writer is aware. This was a riding horse in Jaipur named Ecstacy. A racecourse official, who was not willing to go on record, stated he had little doubt that there had been some additional unpublicized cases. Who knows what the truth is?
We now come to the present case. Five riding horses – breed not specified – from the Western Command’s Shivalik Riding & Polo Club at Chandi Mandir (near Chandigarh) were sampled for EIA but allegedly shipped to Delhi before the results were available. The samples were sent to the Central Military Veterinary Laboratory (CMVL) in Meerut and two of these turned up positive for EIA. The concerned horses were put down at Delhi and their remains incinerated. Meanwhile, several other contingents of Army horses in Delhi for Republic Day have been quarantined there pending further testing.
When the news spread, some turf clubs in India reacted with wholly unnecessary bans on all horses from the North! Biting insects can transmit the disease but have to find a live host in about 30 minutes to an hour for it to spread. Assuming that the affected horses were bitten in sufficient numbers, the disease could spread at most for 4 to 6 kilometres – not 400 kilometres! The North of India is a very large place! Also, riding horses do not find their way to racecourses and the chances of infection in the tightly controlled racing industry are negligible. Finally, it is the height of winter up North and there are few mosquitoes/flies about.
Several auction horses, all with EIA negative test reports, were already in residence at the Rubbing Down shed and Second Enclosure at Pune Racecourse when this news broke. On January 29th, such horses as hailed from the North were unceremoniously evicted from these locations by RWITC officials and taken to the Empress Garden stables across the road. These stables had not been cleaned since October and if reports are to be believed were in a shambles.
Why these Northern horses were not left where they were and others due to arrive later from Western India stud farms were not directed to the Empress Garden stables is not clear. Realization has now dawned that horses at those stables would have to cross a main road four times a day when coming for the rolls and so they are being moved back to the Rubbing Down shed. What an unnecessary brouhaha!
Certainly it would be a wise precaution to retest the horses in Pune with a Coggins test before they go on to their parent centres. However, the burden for this has to fall on the turf clubs, as it is they who would suffer if any infection entered their premises. What’s important to note is that the Indian breeding industry has not been suddenly hit by a meteorite from outer space as is being made out is some quarters, particularly by some publicity/power seekers. Rather, what has always been known – but not revealed – is emerging afresh. A mature reaction from the participants in this drama is required.
