Yesterday, says the Gaming Commission, Steadfast Love was euthanized at Belmont – “humeral fracture, muscle atrophy.” Although it didn’t say, I assume this was a training injury. Steadfast was three years old.
The Commission has also belatedly added one to last year’s toll: Gabriela’s Miracle “succumbed to pneumonia” on October 15 after a two-week illness. She was two and had been raced three times. This makes 107 dead horses at NYS tracks in 2021.
The human participants involved in this egregious cruelty to horses are guilty of Felony Animal Cruelty. The laws against such criminal activities need to be applied to the horse-abusing degenerates in this industry!
Steadfast Love had a humeral fracture and muscle atrophy.
A broken bone can cause muscle atrophy but it takes a while for it to occur. The question is how long did the horse have the fracture for muscle atrophy/wasting to occur?!
Also, immature horses under the stress of training and racing are susceptible to respiratory diseases including viral and bacterial pneumonias.
At 2 yrs. old Gabriela’s Miracle succumbed to the stress caused by the demands of training and racing on an immature physiology.
Further, the immune response in young horses in training and racing is different from that of older horses. The inflammatory response takes longer to resolve in the young horse and can become chronic.
Rose, the statement of “humeral fracture, muscle atrophy” raised a lot of questions in my mind also. I’m not an expert in muscle atrophy but anytime I have ever read about “muscle atrophy” it was referring to the head carriage and the neck muscles regarding the type of person riding and training the horse and their skills and/or lack of skills in riding and handling the horse. Usually, it was a discussion of the training discipline of dressage. In short, the muscle atrophy takes time. I believe much longer than a matter of minutes or hours as would be the case of a broken bone… It raises more questions than answers for me for this reason.