US Piroplasmosis Outbreak "Resolved"
The recent piroplasmosis outbreak in Missouri and Kansas has been declared resolved. The concluding report has a few interesting findings:
Evidence indicates that in this outbreak, ticks, the typical vector of the disease, did not play a role in the transmission of the bacterium that causes piroplasmosis, Theileria equi. No infected ticks were identified and all ticks that were found on the farms were species that have not been shown to transmit the infection.
Disease transmission was attributed to poor management practices such as needle sharing between horses, which can result in transmission of bloodborne disease, including piroplasmosis. (Needle sharing is always a bad idea. There aren't too many bloodborne diseases in horses, but it's still stupid to reuse needles. They're incredibly cheap and there is no valid reason to do this).
The failure to find ticks that can transmit disease suggests that the risk peiod is over in the affected area. No one has explained, however, where this infection came from in the first place. That's an important issue that hasn't received a lot of attention.
There's also the sticky issue of the vanishing quarantined horses. Three infected horses were illegally taken out of quarantine and still have not been recovered. Therefore, "resolved" is a questionable term. The local outbreak is probably over, but these three escapee horses could still be a threat to the horse population wherever they are. The report states that unsubstantiated information indicates the horses may have been taken out of the country. That's obviously a concern for neighbouring countries like Canada.
Hopefully, this episode is really over. Hopefully the infected horses have been taken to an area where there are no ticks capable of transmitting disease. Hopefully people that have them are smart enough not to reuse needles. Hopefully the illegal and reckless action of sneaking out infected horses doesn't cause an outbreak elsewhere and result in the deaths of more horses. However, hope should not be an infection control strategy.
