Don't be blinkered to the cruelty of [horse] racing

Don't be blinkered to the cruelty of [horse] racing

This was written in the UK - I mean who else would use the term blinkered? That being the case, it still has much relation to horse racing in the US and throughout the world. As he states, "At least one racehorse dies each day, and thousands more face lives of suffering."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1645191,00.html

At least one racehorse dies each day, and thousands more face lives of suffering, writes Andrew Tyler

Friday November 18, 2005

The Guardian

Neil Clark used the recent death of triple Cheltenham Gold Cup winner Best Mate to express his irritation that my organisation, Animal Aid, won't shut up about the high levels of early equine death and stress-related injury within horse racing (A race to the death, November 10).

He observed, none the less, that one active racehorse is killed every day in Britain, either on a racecourse or in training. They die mostly from broken necks, broken backs, shattered legs or - like Best Mate - from heart attacks. And he offered, as a particularly stark example, the November 2003 Ludlow race in which two out of the three runners perished.

But this information is not available from the Jockey Club or from any other industry body. The industry resolutely refuses to publish data on how many horses die and where. Clark obtained these facts from Animal Aid's own painstakingly compiled reports (which required poring over thousands of pages of racing returns and examining equine veterinary journals).

Such borrowing is to be welcomed. Yet Clark - like so many other racing pundits across the country - seeks to persuade readers that early equine death is just one of those best-soon-forgotten facts of life. In return for the carnage, he claimed, the public get "glamour and excitement" and the animals enjoy a "cosseted ... five-star" existence. If only.

Thoroughbreds spend most of their time banged up in stables or en route to and from racecourses. It is a life of tedium punctuated by bursts of extreme activity.

The animals themselves are increasingly less robust, as a result of being selectively bred for speed at the expense of bone mass and general health. They suffer more fractures and experience endemic levels of stress-related conditions such as exercise induced pulmonary haemorrhage - ie bleeding lungs. Best Mate himself was a victim. He was pulled out of this year's Cheltenham Cup when blood gushed from his nose during a pre-race training gallop.

Clark went on to write of "progress" on racehorse "rehabilitation". Even this tepid boast is overdone. The industry puts up a pitiful annual sum to care for a small percentage of the 5,000 horses who leave racing every year. Some end up as pet food, others are sold from owner to owner (they adapt badly to "civilian" life), in a downward spiral of neglect.

He also claimed that Animal Aid wants a horseracing ban, a consequence of which would be a drastic reduction in thoroughbred numbers. A ban would indeed have this effect. But while fewer horses would dismay bloodstock dealers, there would be no tears from the unborn foals. Animal Aid is not, in any case, calling for a ban. We have yet to persuade the majority that horse racing is intrinsically and unacceptably exploitative. Its future lies squarely with the punters. My message to them is: you bet ... they suffer.

Andrew Tyler

Director of Animal Aid

· andrew@animalaid.co.uk