Last year a friend and I went up to Durban for the annual Durban July meet. This was a bit more inspired by dressing up, “fox” hunting and taste testing alcohol than horse racing enthusiasm. In fact, I don’t pretend to know anything about equestrianism or specifically horseracing other than that it is composed of short people and thoroughbred horses. Oh, and did I mention gambling? Yes loads of gambling, but fortunately for my wallet I’m not the gambling type. Well, at least not gambling money…

Anyway, this particular year the favourite horse was a three-year-old called Rabiya, driven by jockey Robert Fradd, who competed in 10 races prior to the Durban July of which he won 5. Apparently, this is an exceptional strike rate. Of course not being interested in the horses I didn’t see the race, but near the 1600m mark he fractured his hind leg forcing the jockey to jump off and the animal was consequently put down on track.

Similarly, this past weekend my parents went out to enjoy horse racing at the New Market race course. For most of the event things were highly pleasant, my father even won some cash, until the final race where the horse broke his front leg and was also shot on track.

Some 375 in-racing equines die every year in the UK alone. They may die on the course itself, from injuries received in training or be killed by their owners - considered no longer commercially viable. We use nice words like euthanasia just to make talking about the act of destroying animals more palatable.

I must be completely ignorant of the proper information, but I find this rather disturbing- With all of mankind’s incredible medical achievements (like gene therapy that can convert dead bone graft into new living tissue), we can’t even mend some mere leg fractures on horses? We just shoot them. Sure, there must be a plethora of complications and the animal might suffer a great deal for a period, but so is and does a pelvic bone fracture in humans yet they are allowed to live. In the end, the amount of temporary suffering is worth the possibility of healing and living longer.

In 2005’s Durban July there was a tremendous betting turnover of R61,3m ($9.2m). You’d think that a million dollar industry would have medical care plans capable of healing broken bones and caring for the horses while they mend. But I believe the biggest reason for killing the horses could be more about the money and not so much about ending the animal’s pain. Horses are insured. Why spend thousands of rands in medical care on a horse for 3 months who might never race again if you could put it down and claim on the insurance? Financially it makes a lot of sense, but if this is the case and money is so important I am sure the same sound financial saves could be made by treating the jockeys by the same standard. I mean what good is a jockey with a broken collar bone anyway? In fact, why don’t we insure and euthanize all of our injured athletes? You know, to end their suffering and all that. There is just that minor hurdle of it being against the law, but once that’s changed things will be different. My brother played around with an idea for an advert with a not yet defined purpose of an exciting Rugby game in its climax where things go tough and the excitement is high. Suddenly, the star rugby player is injured and it prevents him from playing any further. A paramedic runs up the field with a six shooter, fires a shot and then with the help of his colleagues carries the now late player off the field via stretcher. The game continues.

I am aware of how dramatically exaggerated even absurd that might sound; as I said before I know very little about the subject and there might be real reason why the industry can’t do anything to improve the situation (please talk to me if you know what it is). However, if it helps by not supporting the sport that place these wonderful animals in grave danger just for my benefit, I’d rather boycott it than be pettily entertained.

See also:
High drama at Durban July
Controversy in horse racing
Gene Therapy Converts Dead Bone Graft to New, Living Tissue
Pelvic Fracture Surgery

This entry was posted on Friday, April 28th, 2006 at 2:56 pm and is filed under General, Philosophy, Stories. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.