Arkansas, Illinois Clamping Down on Equine Milkshakes

Arkansas and Illinois have altered their medication policies to, among other things, provide harsher penalties for trainers if a horse in their care tests positive for a milkshake (a sodium bicarbonate mixture administered via stomach tube, intended to decrease blood acidity, countering the lactic acid that is produced during high speed performance and which increases fatigue).

Milkshake

Share
Favorite
Close

No account yet? Register

ADVERTISEMENT

Arkansas and Illinois have altered their medication policies to, among other things, provide harsher penalties for trainers if a horse in their care tests positive for a milkshake (a sodium bicarbonate mixture administered via stomach tube, intended to decrease blood acidity, countering the lactic acid that is produced during high speed performance and which increases fatigue).

Milkshake screening has been added to all post-race tests in Arkansas and is conducted at the discretion of the state veterinarian in Illinois.

Lonny Powell of the Association of Racing Commissioners International said most jurisdictions at some point have used carbon dioxide testing for milkshakes, but some have since discontinued the practice.

Arkansas implemented its milkshake testing program because of results found during unofficial testing last year. “Based on those unofficial tests, we decided there is a problem and we need to try and stop it,” said George Wadley, DVM, Ark. state veterinarian

Create a free account with TheHorse.com to view this content.

TheHorse.com is home to thousands of free articles about horse health care. In order to access some of our exclusive free content, you must be signed into TheHorse.com.

Start your free account today!

Already have an account?
and continue reading.

Share

Written by:

Victor Ryan is a past writer for The Blood-Horse magazine.

Related Articles

Stay on top of the most recent Horse Health news with

FREE weekly newsletters from TheHorse.com

Sponsored Content

Weekly Poll

sponsored by:

When do you begin to prepare/stock up on products/purchase products for these skin issues?
85 votes · 85 answers

Readers’ Most Popular

Sign In

Don’t have an account? Register for a FREE account here.

Need to update your account?

You need to be logged in to fill out this form

Create a free account with TheHorse.com!