Australian Mystery Disease

Reports have been circulating that there is a disease similar to mare reproductive loss syndrome (MRLS) occurring in Australia. In a correspondence, Nigel Perkins, BVSc, MS, Dipl. ACT, FACVSc, of the private consulting firm AusVet Animal Health

Share
Favorite
Close

No account yet? Register

ADVERTISEMENT

Reports have been circulating that there is a disease similar to mare reproductive loss syndrome (MRLS) occurring in Australia. In a correspondence, Nigel Perkins, BVSc, MS, Dipl. ACT, FACVSc, of the private consulting firm AusVet Animal Health Services, said, “Between March-November 2004, a number of mares in the Hunter Valley region and in Queensland suffered abortions due to a similar disease process. A small number of farms suffered devastating losses (15 of 25 mares on one farm), while most affected farms had one or two cases. Preliminary data indicate that between 15-20 separate farms may have been affected.”


He has termed this problem equine amnionitis and fetal loss (EAFL).


John Freestone, DVM, Dipl. ACT, resident veterinarian at Coolmore, Australia, said, “I can talk with confidence about the situation on Coolmore, and over the last season we had less placentitis and abortion than in any of the past five years.”


It was noted that there are similarities between EAFL and MRLS in that pathologists have found amnionitis and infection of the amniotic portion of the umbilical cord. However, there have been no widespread abortions throughout all the gestational stages in Australia as there were in the United States in 2001 and 2002. Some Australian veterinarians are reluctant to put a label on this problem at this time

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:

Kimberly S. Brown is the editor of EquiManagement/EquiManagement.com and the group publisher of the Equine Health Network at Equine Network LLC.

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:

Where do you primarily feed your horse?
299 votes · 299 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!