APHIS
Stakeholders Announcement
Veterinary Services
June 27, 2007
USDA Releases
Equine Events Report
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Animal
Health Monitoring System (NAHMS) has released
a descriptive report entitled, Equine 2005 Baseline
Reference of Equine Health Management Strategies
at Equine Events in Six States.
Conducted in California, Colorado, Florida,
Kentucky, New York and Texas, the Equine 2005
Events Study focuses on describing health-
management factors at equine events that could
impact the occurrence and potential spread of equine
infectious diseases. Examples of events include:
sales or auctions, shows, horse trials, western events,
fairs, rodeos, race meets, polo matches, organized
trail rides and training clinics.
In addition, the study looks at the type of informa-
tion recorded by event coordinators and organizers
regarding participants and their equids and explores
animal-health control strategies employed at the
events.
Here are a few highlights from the NAHMS Equine
2005 Events Study:
• The most common event type was show/trial
(57.7 percent of events) followed by western
event/fair/rodeo (21.9 percent of events). Race/
polo events accounted for 6.1 percent of all
events. Colorado and Texas had a higher per-
centage of western event/rodeo/fair events com-
pared to events in the four other states.
• Overall, 57.1 percent of events did not require a
health certificate for equids attending the event,
while 20.3 percent required a health certificate
for all equids, and 22.4 percent required a health
certificate only for equids from out of state. A
higher percentage of events in Kentucky had
some type of health requirement compared to the
other five states.
• A higher percentage of race/polo events (57.9
percent) required a health certificate for all equids
compared to show/trial events (14.5 percent).
Equine 2005 Baseline Reference of Equine Health
Management Strategies at Equine Eve