In August of 2007, a package of shuttle stallions were in quarantine at Sydney’s Eastern Creek facility, when some of the valuable animals began to show signs of illness. It wasn’t long before one had tested positive to the debilitating virus, Equine Influenza.
Peter McGauran was Federal Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry at the time and was cognisant of the threat that the virus could pose to the equine community.
"I’d always known in the racing industry that it was the most catastrophic of all diseases because of its transmission,” he recalled.
“If it broke out, most horses would be affected, so I always had it in the back of my mind.”
The outbreak of Equine Influenza resulted in severe restrictions | Image courtesy of The NSW Department of Primary Industries
But McGauran had no reason to believe that the Eastern Creek quarantine facility could not contain the outbreak.
“The officials were reassuring us that… the quarantine centre was secure, so much so that I had never visited it, what with everything else, it wasn’t a pressing priority for us and everybody believed it to be entirely secure”
“The officials were reassuring us that… the quarantine centre was secure, so much so that I had never visited it...” - Peter McGauran
"The Royal Commission (which McGauran’s government initiated, following the outbreak) found that was a joke.”
As history shows, Equine Influenza was soon discovered in a horse at Sydney’s Centennial Park riding school and before 2007 was over, more than 47,000 horses were infected and the equine populations of New South Wales and South East Queensland had endured a COVID-19-style lockdown, enforced initially as a result of the New South Wales Department of Primary Industries’ (DPI) AUSVET Plan.
The infamous ‘Zones’
Arrowfield Stud’s John Messara quickly entered the scene and together with his own team, government officials, Racing NSW and leading breeders devised a unique strategy to ensure that commercial farms could fill stallion books and mate mares…
"A zonal structure in New South Wales, where we had horses that, while they stayed in that zonal area, could move,” he remembered.
“They couldn’t move outside of it. If they moved outside of it, they couldn’t come back and those that were outside that zone, couldn’t come in.
John Messara recalls the implications of the zoning structure imposed | Image courtesy of Ashlea Brennan
“And that would account for the great majority of broodmares and stallions in this state. You made the assumption that every horse in that zone would get it and you were prepared to cop that.”
This led to the breeders of the Hunter Valley banding together like never before.
“Look, everyone mucked in a bit,” said Darley’s Alastair Pulford.
“There was a paucity of stallions, a lot of stallions, especially the shuttle stallions which hadn’t turned up and we were ringing each other on a daily basis to see what stallions might have been available to cover a certain mare!”
Industry-wide impacts
The Equine Influenza outbreak had ripple effects throughout the twin industries of racing and breeding, which the episode explores. Not only were mares covered by stallions based on availability, rather than suitability, but Racing broadcasters were required to bring in content from regional Australia and offshore.
Much as it has been with COVID-19, vaccination was a hot topic. Leanne Begg was one of a legion of vets – some called out of retirement to pitch in – that rolled out a vaccination program.
Vets were even called out of retirement to help contain the outbreak | Image courtesy of The NSW Department of Primary Industries
“We had the dirty vets, which were dealing with the sick horses at Randwick… and the clean vets,” she explained.
“Because it was a genetically modified vaccine, there was a big hoo-ha… they went out and were ring vaccinating affected horses, just like a fire, stamping it out.”
The podcast tracks the timeline of the outbreak from beginning to end, investigating the key role of Racing NSW CEO Peter V’Landys, the unprecedented press interest in equine industries and the government's attempts to get an industry back on its feet.
Also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
