Eight Belles Was On Bute? Oh No!
June 6, 2008
PETA seriously needs to find something more productive to do than bother Eight Belles’ poor owners and trainer. I came across this today on the PETA site:
“Eight Belles’ trainer, Larry Jones, has admitted injecting the horse with Phenylbutazone–a powerful anti-inflammatory drug–just 27 hours before the Kentucky Derby, but no investigation has been undertaken to determine if Eight Belles’ handlers knowingly jeopardized her safety. PETA is also asking Stengel to file criminal charges under Kentucky’s cruelty-to-animals statute, which prohibits “cruel or injurious mistreatment” of animals.”
Are you kidding me? If they had done any actual research they would know the Phenylbutazone, commonly known as Bute, is relatively mild when used in horses. It’s like giving a horse a Tylenol, not a morphine drip. I’m pretty sure human athletes can’t be popping Vicodin when they compete, but I’m gonna bet that Tylenol isn’t illegal in most sports. And I’m confident that Bute isn’t strong enough to have any cause in Eight Belles’ injuries. It’s effective, but it just isn’t that strong. If it was, it would be banned.
I love horses. I’ve loved them my whole life. I believe it is our responsibility to care for them, which includes knowing and listening to them; they’ll tell us if they’re hurting or if they’ve had too much. I believe in working together as partners, not forcing them into submission.
I think what happened to Eight Belles is horribly tragic. What happened to Teddy O’Connor is tragic. Anytime a life is lost in an accident it’s tragic. We should always look at the root causes, and see what can be done to prevent similar happenings in the future.
But I’m tired of all the hype and outrage about Eight Belles. People are making a big deal about it because it was such a high profile event, and they are lashing out with misplaced assumptions and very little knowledge of equine anatomy, personality, and racing. The funny thing is, most horse people I know — the people who’ve dedicated their lives to these animals and understand them — aren’t that outraged. We understand that sometimes accidents happen and there’s no way we can prevent them. We hate it and we always blame ourselves, deserved or not. And we try to find ways to prevent such things from happening again. It’s how we learn. And it’s good that we feel.
I wish PETA, activists, and people with loud mouths would find more productive ways to help horses; addressing issues that are serious crises. Start raising money to provide hay to people and their horses who are having a hard time getting it; that’s a huge problem this year. Find the people who aren’t feeding their horses, aren’t turning them out, aren’t grooming and caring for them, and truly are abusing them.
You want to help racehorses? Advocate to move up racing ages; the real problem is that thoroughbreds are running on bodies that aren’t fully developed, not that they were given some Bute.
I’m quite sure that racing is never going to be entirely banned the way PETA and other activists would like it to be. But I think all the stir about Eight Belles may help to move it in a direction that is a little safer for the horses. No matter what sport or discipline we engage in, there are always improvements we can make for the safety of horses and riders. We should never stop learning. Or improving. Or protecting.
Posted in Horse Care, Horse News, Horse Racing, Jackie's Thoughts
June 6th, 2008 at 11:01 am
Oh For Petes Sake here. PETA needs to just GO AWAY– FAR FAR AWAY. What a bunch of ignorant bunny humping tree hugging tye dye wearing mater farming hallucinating dumb .
*cough cough* Sorry Jackie….. They burn my tush.
Why don’t they HELP in the hay shortage? Because they are hoping more animals will go hungry so they can claim all animal / livestock ownership is reprehensible, and use it to forward their agenda (of NO ONE owning animals… and no people on Earth, from what i understand… heck if they are worried about no people on Earth, then I am sure there are some firearms folks who will loan out a pistol or two for them to do the deed…)
Holy cow– sorry again Jackie…
I best quit now…
June 6th, 2008 at 3:27 pm
Well, I mostly agree with you and PETA is known for its over-reactions and rabid animal rights agenda, so they’d rather no horses raced at all. BUT, it can also be argued that without the bute, Eight Belles may have been found lame and would not have raced, so would not have died. I hardly think it humane to routinely inject bute (and cortisone!) racehorse so they can continue to make money while disregarding the big picture of over-used joints and tendons that, while possibly only mildly inflamed, are certainly not at their best.
Check out this article for more thoughts on this issue:
http://therail.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/06/04/drugs-and-racehorses/
>snip< When there is swelling in a joint or tendon sheath, excess synovial fluid is secreted, distending the joint structures, and in some cases, deforming them, making for irregular movement. The reason for excess fluid in a joint is most often damage to the sensitive joint structures; damage to the synovial membranes, articular cartilages, ligaments, tendons, and underlying bone, any or all of the above. Damaged joints are weakened joints.
June 6th, 2008 at 3:31 pm
My horse has been on a gram a day for many years. A junkie! Harv got injured when I first bought him — in retrospect it was minor but i was freaking out. My vet, a crusty old lady, dressed me down. “They’re gonna break your heart! Get used to it!”
It is true. These wonderful animals are just accident prone, in part b/c of us and in part b/c it is just the say they are. When I heard about Teddy, I wondered how, if an Olympic contender can’t be kept out of harm’s way by an entourage of handlers, can any of us hope to keep our animals safe. Like my vet said, get used to it.
June 6th, 2008 at 3:40 pm
Teddy’s death was an accident and manure happens. Eight Belles, if drugged, should not have been running IMO.
Foreign racing jurisdictions run clean and have far fewer “incidents” than the US.
June 6th, 2008 at 3:57 pm
You’ve got a lot of good points there. Bute is not a dangerous drug if administered correctly, but like Karin said would she have been able to race without it? Who knows. In my opinion all of these horses are raced too early and should be given a chance to mature. Racing will never be shut down completely but I think a few more rules for the safety of horses is in order.
PETA is a crazy bunch and a bit over zealous, you are right they should turn their attention to helping the starving and abused horses in this country, but oh wait a minute. that’s not a big profile case to get them recognition, it’s only a bunch of backyard ‘little people’ who would never get their names in the paper. I can’t support a crazy bunch of fanatics like them.
June 8th, 2008 at 9:27 pm
Oh, PETA can go scratch up a pole!
June 9th, 2008 at 11:22 am
Karin - you make a good point about Bute potentially masking an unsoundness problem. It’s definitely an issue to use Bute as a maintenance drug, because you are ignoring the symptoms of wear and tear, natural or otherwise. It’s interesting to know that racing in other countries does ban these type of drugs. I’d wonder if there are fewer accidents though, because there are less drugs in use or because there are less horses racing. It would be interesting to see the percentages.
Stacey - that’s certainly a hard lesson to learn, but one worth having. I think there’s a difference between using Bute to help a horse who’s already been injured, and using it to mask minor problems that could become major injuries. We do what we can to protect them, and then take care of them if anything happens. Well, a lot of us do anyway.
Mrs Mom - Don’t worry about it.
I don’t mind your rants.
GreyHorseMatters - I’m with you; if we want to see real change we have to get to the root of the problem; and using Bute isn’t it. I’m all about taking good care of animals, but PETA is just way out there. What do they think would happen if all horse sports and equine ownership is banned? Now that would be cruel and unusual treatment.
June 9th, 2008 at 7:34 pm
PETA is all wet as usual. I don’t know if I”ve ever seen a time that they hadn’t gone totally over the top trying to find anything to support their agenda. It would be really nice if they would take that time and energy and do something productive.
I’m not sure that bute can mask something really glaring. My experience over the years has been you want to not mask something small, that would be better detected before it turned into something big.
Horses with big hurts still hurt on bute. I’ve seen lots of evidence to support that. Bute will help to keep the swelling down so the swelling doesn’t cause damage of its own but that really banged up horse will still hurt.
There are painkillers that will cover that kind of pain but they are all illegal.