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[Jeff P]

Part I --

The recent fatality spikes at Turf Paradise and Santa Anita found me spending a lot of time doing Google searches and reading articles about thoroughbred microfractures, fractures, treatments, breakdowns, and possible causes.

I'm not a veterinarian, and I'm certainly no medical expert. But one thing has become crystal clear to me.

When you compare the days when John Henry ran vs. today or even five years ago --

There's a huge difference in our society, especially when you look at the degree to which drugs were used back then vs. right now.

Back then, drug use was certainly prevalent. But I think our world view was a little different then vs. what it is now. We were a little more judicious when it came to using drugs. I think we had a tendency to use them if there was no other choice, and get the patient off them at the first opportunity.

In today's society, not just drug use, but the idea that drugs are how we should be treating everything has become widely accepted. Literally, no matter what the ailment, we have not one but perhaps dozens of different drugs for that - and we have this idea that we need to get the patient on a drug protocol immediately. Imo, it's off the charts.

This is true for both humans and horses.

Many times the latest drug has unintended side effects that fail to show up in early testing - side effects that are only discovered after a large population of patients has been taking the drug.

Sadly, horses can't talk.


More to come --


-jp

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