Under its “Equine Safety Report,” Keeneland released this yesterday:
“During race 5, #2 February Son sustained an injury and was attended to by an expert team of veterinarians led by KHRC Chief Vet Dr. Nick Smith in consultation with Dr. Stuart Brown, Vice President of Equine Safety at Keeneland. Given the extent of the injury, it was determined that humane euthanasia was in the best interest of the horse.”
(The track also added the customary – and loathsome – “heartfelt condolences” to the owner, Captain Jack Stable, and trainer, Anthony Granitz.)
While some may argue that this disclosure should be commended, especially relative to the vast majority of other tracks, let’s be real here: this is pure PR. “Attended to by an expert team of veterinarians”; “VP of Equine Safety”; “humane euthanasia”; “best interest of the horse.” The implication is that “we’re all over this,” and that this is rare. It’s not: 27 horses lost their lives at Keeneland tracks last year. 27.
February was six years old, and this was his 30th time under the whip. On its replay page, by the way, Keeneland has this for the 5th. We’re all about transparency – until we’re not.
Cruel and inhumane treatment stop the whipping What’s being done about horses dying and dying. Consider if a horse dies he should not have been on the track. Too nonchalant about these deaths get going and change things. A beautiful animal used up🛏
With the millions of dollars spent on horses, the “Al Capones of Horseracing” want in on the action. Oh, by the way, Havna…who? 🐴
Must be Triple Crown season again; the fine folks in the industry are prepping to get a little transparent about a tiny portion of the daily carnage they inflict upon their equine victims.
I’m guessing they’re looking to get ahead of last year’s TC disaster (“Here a kill, there a kill, everywhere a kill, kill…”), so the public won’t be too shocked and saddened when another perfect Triple Crown of Carnage rears its hideous head.
Lack of transparency is also noted in that Keeneland released an article yesterday to the general public and only admitted to 4 deaths in 2023.
Thank you, Patrick, for pointing out that the so-called “transparency” in this one death of an equine racing slave was only to create the illusion that this “rarely happens” and the illusion that this cruel and deadly gambling racket “cares” about their disposable equine racing slaves.
This whole display of several veterinarians attending to a horse with injuries that were not mentioned in detail is extremely self-serving in an industry that kills MULTIPLE innocent horses every day somewhere in the United States, Canada and several other foreign countries.
I can’t help but think that the injuries that the horse suffered from were so obviously bad that one person, and not even a veterinarian, could have determined the horse needed to be euthanized immediately to spare the horse from further prolonged suffering.
Imagine what kind of racing-induced injuries a horse could be suffering from in excruciating pain that a team of “expert” veterinarians could not repair.
The horse couldn’t be saved by a team of expert veterinarians.
Wasn’t it convenient to purposely NOT mention what the injuries to the horse were???
So I wonder how long it took for these people to put on their self-serving show of concern deceiving whoever, pretending they care about a disposable gambling chip? Thoroughbred racehorses are not much more than disposable gambling chips in this gambling racket.
How much longer was FEBRUARY SON forced to suffer while these people, these so-called experts, were putting on this big show to create the illusion that they care about a horse when they really don’t care about the horse?
It’s their bank accounts that these self-serving, horse exploiting people care about at the expense of the public, the government subsidies/ Corporate Welfare and the lives of the horses.
#EndHorseracingNOW
I got the replay before the unavailable delete. He was running 1/2 all the way around the oval. Pretty close to the finish,the horses behind were gaining closer to the front. There was no bobbling no fall from February Son. His left front may have been injured. It was hard to tell. Oh and his name came from his birthdate..February 14th.