IDA Blasts Bay Meadows Following Deadly Horse Races

Organization Calls for a Permanent End to Horse Racing at the Track

San Rafael, Calif.—After the deaths of two racehorses last week reportedly due to unsafe track conditions, international animal protection organization In Defense of Animals (IDA) is blasting Bay Meadows for negligence. The group is also calling for a permanent end to horse racing at the track.

According to IDA, thoroughbreds used for racing commonly suffer from a host of dangerous afflictions. Because thoroughbreds have been selectively bred over the course of many centuries for a single and very specific purpose – to run as fast as possible – their bodies are fragile and easily damaged by even the slightest misstep. Broken leg bones are a common occurrence in horseracing and drugs that mask pain only increase the chances of serious injury because a horse may keep running on a limb that has already been damaged. This can cause the bone to actually poke through the skin, leading to infection and extreme pain.

"Racing on a crowded track that can be as hard as concrete at breakneck speed is already an inherently dangerous activity for animals who weigh in at around 1,000 pounds and yet have ankles that are about the same size as a human’s," said Elliot M. Katz, DVM, President of IDA. "Injuries are part and parcel of these events and Bay Meadows must immediately stop racing horses into the grave."

Studies indicate that approximately 800 thoroughbreds die every year in North America from injuries incurred during racing. This figure would be even higher if horses who died in the course of training were factored in. Because most racehorse "owners" see these animals purely as economic investments, they choose to simply have injured thoroughbreds put down to spare themselves the expense of veterinary services. The least sympathetic investors recover some of their losses by selling injured horses to slaughterhouses. According to the National Horse Protection Coalition (NHPC), as many as 100,000 horses are slaughtered each year in the U.S. and exported for human consumption to European countries. The NHPC estimates that 16% of these are thoroughbred racehorses. Their flesh is exported to foreign countries overseas for human consumption or turned into "pet food."