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PA Dept. of Agriculture: Virus puts Doylestown Township horse farm under quarantine

Posted on Dec 24, 2015

by Adrian Sipes

 

Posted: Thursday, December 24, 2015 2:00 pm

PA Dept. of Agriculture: Virus puts Doylestown Township horse farm under quarantine By Adrian Sipes, staff writer The Intelligencer

Posted on Dec 24, 2015

by Adrian Sipes

A Doylestown Township farm was placed under quarantine Wednesday following the death of three horses, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture.

"They had developed severe neurological signs and reached a point where euthanasia was the only recourse," said Craig Shultz, the agency's director of the Bureau of Animal Health and Diagnostic Services.

The horses from Miles View Farm on Ferry Road were euthanized after contracting an aggressive neurological form of equine herpesvirus (EHV-1) that's called equine herpes myeloencephalopathy (EHM). The virus is does not pose a health hazard to humans, but the farm will remain under quarantine for a minimum of 21 days provided the remaining 40 horses on the farm do not demonstrate clinical signs of EHM. Additional testing for the virus will also be conducted as a condition of the quarantine.

"We're fully cooperating at the cooperation of all of our borders, and staff is observing all precautions and the investigation continues," said Douglas Raymond, who co-owns the farm.EHV-1 commonly circulates in horse populations, and it can produce a variety of clinical signs that indicate a horse has been infected, such as abortion in pregnant mares and respiratory disease. The EHM form of the virus, according to Shultz, can cause horses to suffer varying degrees of paralysis and ataxia; it's not usual for horses to be euthanized because of an EHM infection.

The state agency is unsure where or how the horses came into contact with the debilitating disease, but Shultz said one of the horses recently attended a horse show Dec. 12 in New Jersey. That horse presented with EHM on Dec. 23.

"That's a rather long incubation period, but certainly we have contacted the New Jersey animal health authorities and they are actively engaged in tracing all potential contacts from that event as well."

Shultz went on to say the disease poses the greatest threat to the premises in which EHM is detected. The disease's ability to go airborne is minimized to a small geographic area, but it can be contracted by other horses from contaminated equipment or by horse handlers who go from horse to horse.

The state department has yet to find additional EHM cases at other locations but, according to Shultz, the agency will continue to monitor and trace horse activity that could "start this whole process again."

Adrian Sipes: 215-345-3147; email: asipes@calkins.com; Twitter: @IntellSipes