FEI to allow use of bute

convert

Read an article on this over the weekend. What do you think?

It's not something I'd agree with, tbh as I think it may encourage the competing of horses who aren't in a state to be competed (i.e. not fully sound, arthritic, etc.) which can't be good for the welfare of the horse. Fine, if it needs to be used to treat an injury or pain, and is used properly, that's a different story, but if it's used while competing, it could cause problems further down the line re the horse's welfare, etc. Just my 2c worth. Would love to hear what other people think.

Wicked

i'd be inclined to agree, you give bute to treat pain, if you need to use it in the first place then the animal shouldnt be competing.

I don't think it's a good idea for the same reasons, horses will be dosed up on pain killers. it will cause more long term damage than good.

finbarrk

I think it's a disaster because it leaves the situation too open for abuse. It seems to have been rushed through without proper discussion. The major equestrian countries were all against it but the vote was 53 to 48.
I guess it was the countries that partake in endurance that were pushing it.
And we know about Princess Hayias husband.

MDFM

I'm not for it nor am i against it..it depends on the individual situation. It is already allowed in certain aged animals under sji rules, following veterinary certification - however, unless they clarify what levels the bute can be administered up to and in what circumstances it can be allowed to and in these circumstances if the testing is sufficient to prevent over abuse its something i'm not against. It is a thin line though and will be open to debate and criticism - is it going to be deemed a performance enhancer as such in doping cases?

fits

Are the FEI absolutely mental?

What are the reasons given for this?

finbarrk

http://www.chronofhorse.com/article/shocking-vote-legalizes-bute-fei-competition

Website wrote:

Shocking Vote Legalizes Bute In FEI Competition
By: Pippa Cuckson

No one could have predicted that the Fédération Equestre Internationale delegates would vote to legalize threshold levels of drugs like phenylbutazone at the General Assembly in Copenhagen, Denmark, on Nov. 19.

The FEI has been struggling to deal with doping in equestrian sport for years. Medals had to be stripped and reassigned after show jumping drug scandals at the last two Olympic Games, and equestrian superstars like Germany’s Isabell Werth and Great Britain’s Michael Whitaker were set down for doping incidents this summer.

It should have been a landmark day to pass historic clean sport reform at the General Assembly. This summer, Great Britain’s Lord Stevens headed up a commission with the mission of investigating doping in equestrian sport and proposing changes for the better. His commission ended up partnering with the Ljungqvist Commission for Clean Sport, headed up by Arne Ljungqvist, chairman of the IOC Medical Commission and vice president of the World Anti-Doping Agency.

Two hours were set aside for presentations on the topic. Delegates heard powerful speeches from the leaders of the joint commissions on wide ranging reforms for medication control and the “professionalization” of the sport. Lord Stevens pulled no punches. Equestrian was “as good as dead” if it was not clean.

So the room was nothing short of stupefied when FEI veterinary director Graham Cooke dropped into his presentation a brief item that delegates would be voting for the controlled use of phenylbutazone—banned outright 20 years ago—and two non-steroidal anti-inflammatories.

Significant global players—the United States, Germany, Ireland, Britain, Australia, New Zealand and Sweden—made impassioned pleas for zero tolerance. But when the secret ballots were cast, “bute” was back in international competition by a margin of 53 votes to 48.

Even FEI vice-president Sven Holmberg was moved to tell the floor, “What you have just done has cut the legs off the clean sport campaign. If you thought recent media reaction against rollkur has been tough, just wait to see what happens with this.”

A request in the afternoon for a re-vote from the German president Breido Graf zu Rantzau—backed by Ireland and Britain—was rejected on the grounds that some delegates had gone home, and that there had been no ambiguity about the motion.

The controversy lay in the separate choice between continuing with an Oct. 20-dated list of prohibited substances (also referred to, confusingly, as the “current list,”) and adopting a “progressive list.” The latter does not prohibit phenylbutazone (up to 8 mcg/ml in plasma or serum), salicylic acid (up to 750mcg/ml in urine and up to 6.5 mcg/ml in plasma or serum) and flunixin (up to 500 mcg/ml in plasma or serum) so long as those substances are not detected in a horse's sample above the prescribed limits noted and are used in isolation and not combined.

The progressive list also sanctions acetycysteine, dichloroacetate (lactanase) and isoxuprine.

Where Did This Come From?

The FEI seemed as baffled by the furor as delegates were by the FEI’s matter-of-fact delivery of the bute option, and its apparent failure to have rehearsed any sort of rationale or justification for the inevitable barrage of questions.


At first the top table replied that the move had come ”from the industry,” prodding Bo Helander, the Swedish delegate and former FEI chief executive to ask, “I have been in the FEI for 30 years and have never heard of this mysterious body, ‘the industry.’ What is it, and what place does it have in the FEI?”

Noting that the threshold for bute was three-times the previous threshold before the outright ban, Helander also thought FEI budget forecasts would now be at risk. Major commercial partners such as Rolex would surely not wish to be associated with a sport tolerant of certain drugs.

"If the FEI accepts this, there will be uproar in many countries. It's completely unacceptable for horse welfare, and changes the whole philosophy of the FEI," said Helander.

Graham Cooke then offered the rationale that the featured anti-inflammatories were variously still tolerated by racing authorities and/or the U.S. Equestrian Federation. USEF CEO John Long swiftly grabbed the microphone to reject any inference that USEF had initiated the move. “That is not our position, and we do not support it,” he said.

The following day, FEI officials explained their position further.

“The Prohibited Substance List adopted by the FEI General Assembly on 19 November—the 'Progressive List'—allows the restricted use in competition of a limited number of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory substances at very low levels. The World Anti Doping Agency has no restriction on the use of NSAIDs for human athletes. We should be able to treat not only our human athletes as approved by WADA, but also—and under similar principles—our horses close to competition. These very low levels have been established based on scientific evidence specifically to protect the welfare of the competition horse. The data that was requested was to establish the levels needed to provide minor anti-inflammatory relief only.”

Not all delegates seemed to have received a notice sent out on Nov. 13—just six days before the vote—about the Oct. 20 progressive lists. Ulf Helgstrand, president of the Danish federation, urged the FEI to park the issue of the progressive list until a later date.

"If we introduce the list, I'm afraid the public and sponsors will shoot us down and say we only want to stop the number of positive tests,” he said.

Frank Kempermann, director of Aachen and incoming chairman of FEI dressage, warned that he would lose sponsors. "I can't understand how this proposal can be made. Our message is clean sport. How can we justify that to sponsors if we allow bute?”

Only one delegate, a veterinarian from South Africa, lent support. He thought it reasonable that bute could be given if a horse stepped on a stone or suffered a mild colic the day before a competition. "If it happened to a human, he would be allowed to take Voltaren [diclofenac] and ride," he said. "It is so expensive to get a horse to an event, we should be able to treat."

Clean Sport Proposals Accepted

Earlier, the overall package of clean sport proposals was overwhelmingly approved to the satisfaction of the joint-commission chairs, Ljungqvist and Lord Stevens.



Apart from an extended list of prohibited substances and a clear division between the offences of doping to affect performance and genuine medication errors, all the other clean sport proposals previously publicized were adopted. These include an independent integrity unit, tighter stable security and access, “professionalization” of officials and veterinarians to reduce vested interests and education programs. National federations will be expected to bring their domestic medication controls in line with the FEI’s and testing laboratories will be harmonized round the world.

New sanctions start with a minimum two-year ban for actual doping offences. Lesser offences can be dealt with for first-timers with an on-the-spot fine. A confidential hotline will allow people with concerns about suspected offenders to help intelligence-led investigations, which may include out-of-competition testing. Sample-testing will also be more transparent.

A revised Clean Sport microsite was due to go live immediately after the assembly, and the legal department has produced a layman’s guide to the rules.

“Ultimately it was down to the equestrian community to make the final decision, and they have voted in support of the package as a whole. The two Commissions have put in an enormous amount of work to come up with these recommendations, and it is particularly gratifying that we have received such overwhelming support for the clean sport campaign from the national federations,” said Ljungqvist.

“We said yesterday that the FEI needed to adopt these recommendations before it could be given a clean bill of health. They have been approved by a massive majority, and now the sport can move forward,” said Lord Stevens.

Princess Haya’s repeated urgings that the bute controversy should not be allowed to detract from the overall significance of the meeting seemed likely to go unheeded, but it was clear that she was emotional when addressing delegates after they had approved the reforms she has promoted with a passion for the past year.

“This is a true landmark moment in the history of our sport. The overwhelming support of the national federations is proof that we are moving in the right direction thanks to the incredible work done by the Ljungqvist and Stevens Commissions. This vote has given us the power to roll out Clean Sport and allow us to restore the public image of our sport as a clean and uncorrupt product,” she said.

shanagarry

It sounds crazy. Can anyone give any insight until what the levels actually mean in practical terms? Though given that it is 3 times higher than the old level, it must be pretty high.

I wouldn't be against allowing a very low level of bute in the system, to allow horses back into competition a bit sooner, but with the level set such that a horse still actively taking bute wouldn't be ok, but one off it maybe a week would.

Allowing horses to compete while on bute is just ludicrus. And the comparison to a person is farcical - a person can guage the level of pain they are feeling, and decide for themselves if they want to risk long term injury for short term gain. A poor horse is at the mercy of a potentially unscrupulous rider who just wants that win or medal and isn't bothered if the horse can never be ridden again or worse.

latimeria

Hello shanagarry, this is a text that I wrote on that issue to publish it in English speaking communities. The info you're looking for is in it...

Please forward the link or publish it in other communities.


Since Nov. 23, there’s a petition online in Germany: http://www.no-fei.com

Please sign there or try to set up something similar for English speaking countries! And publish it wherever possible – now it’s time to give FEI a public feedback that they never would have expected. I don’t know a single person supporting sick horses needing medical treatment to be competed. Raise your voice!

Example Phenylbutazone:
From January 1, 2010 it will be allowed to show a horse (in FEI organized competitions) with a serum drug concentration of 8 µg/ml. Phenylbutazone is metabolized quickly in the liver, so after oral application of a “normal” dose the serum concentration reaches approx. 2 µg/ml after 24 hrs. It increases to higher levels only after daily administration of the drug. Dawn M. Boothe writes in H. Richard Adams’ book “Veterinary pharmacology and therapeutics": “The recommended therapeutic concentration of phenylbutazone in horses is 5-20 µg/mL“ (p. 441). This means: a horse with a serum concentration of 8 µg/ml is in full therapy with phenylbutazone. From the scientific viewpoint this serum concentration is not a mere relic of a terminated medical treatment.

For more scientific information on non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDS) please compare “Equine clinical pharmacology” (Joseph Bertone), too. Bute is mentioned on pp. 255 ff, and you can also find information on the other drugs approved by FEI now. (both books can be accessed via google)

Best regards

Ulrike from Germany

Sorry in advance that probably I will not be able to answer again - I'm just trying to publish the link to the petition in several countries...

doctor evil

Crazy, you can use bute but not Sudocream.

latimeria

You can also use Isoxsuprine, a vasodilatant (beta2-sympathomimetic) to treat your horses' navicular disease (without threshold), acetylcysteine, if it suffers from RAO (without threshold, too) and other, if you want to. But only one at a time. So if your horse suffers from navicular disease, arthritis and RAO, you will unfortunately not be able to compete anymore... :rolleyes:

I guess it's time to do something about it. I think it's our responsibility not to allow our furry partners to be competed even if they'd need a time-out because they're sick. So please, be kind enough to spread the link in english speaking communities.

Theponylady

convert wrote: »

Read an article on this over the weekend. What do you think?

It's not something I'd agree with, tbh as I think it may encourage the competing of horses who aren't in a state to be competed (i.e. not fully sound, arthritic, etc.) which can't be good for the welfare of the horse. Fine, if it needs to be used to treat an injury or pain, and is used properly, that's a different story, but if it's used while competing, it could cause problems further down the line re the horse's welfare, etc. Just my 2c worth. Would love to hear what other people think.

I'm afraid, I'd have to disagree. I think it's totally unfair to horses that we expect them to be perfect, and expect them to never have any aches or pains, while expecting them to be fit and work hard. While I don't agree on covering up problems, I do believe that giving a horse two grams of bute 24 hours before a competition is not going to cover up any sort of major problems. The bute really isn't working after 12 hours. It's simply going to work as an inflammatory, and very minor pain killer, basically the same as aspirin. A horse that is worked pretty much every day, is doing a lot of jumping or collected work or whatever, is BOUND to have minor aches and pains, possibly minor arthritis, just like any human athlete.

Now, if they were saying you could use 2 grams of bute twice a day up to the time of competition, then I'd have a serious issue with that. It's could well cover up a serious problem, could help a truly lame horse get through a competition it shouldn't be in, as well as be a problem for it's stomach etc.

But at the dose and time limits they have decided upon, I think it's very fair, very useful, and a good thing. There are very very very few horses who reach FEI level who don't have minor issues-just like there are very few human atheletes who reach world class level without having some aches and pains. It's unrealistic.

FEI are backing down from this.

finbarrk

Well they seem to have the introduction of the new list put back to April anyway. Maybe the list could be changed by then.


http://www.horseandhound.co.uk/news/397/292428.html

finbarrk

I was dissapointed in our top riders response to the initial ruling. Most of them were for it.

Theponylady

As am I. I believe it is totally and completely unfair for us to work and compete our horses, and not allow any sort of therupetic drug to be used. This zero tolerance thing that has been used in the past often means that horses do not recieve the best care they could get, because it could mean they cannot compete a month or so on down the road. I think it's unfair that a horse is not allowed to be maintained and kept as comfortable as possible while it's competing.

I am pleased that they are finally going away from this rediculous zero tolerance policy, and starting to become more realistic.

An athlete is allowed to take aspirin and various other therupetic drugs(not many, but some). I believe it is only right and fair horses be allowed to be given small amounts, and that trace amounts of drugs that are not affecting performance but were prescribed by a veterinarian should be allowed.

I think it's an absolute farce that so many of our top performers have been eliminated from various competitions, including the Olympics, NOT because they were "drugged" in order to heighten their performance or to cover up unsoundness, but because they showed trace amounts of various drugs that had either been given weeks before the event to treat various things to maintain the health and soundness of the horse, or that were used in creams etc. used to maintain the health/soundness of the horse.

It has been impossible in the past to treat top level performance horses with any certainty that it was allowed. There was no list of allowed or not allowed drugs. You just had to guess, stay away from drugs that people had been banned for in the past, and hope that what you were planning on using was not going to get you in trouble.

I applaude the FEI for finally making an attempt to make a list of banned and allowed substances, and to try and make levels reasonable, to where our horses can be maintained using the best possible methods. It's late, it should have been done years ago, and there needs to be a LOT of tweaking done to the list. But, at least they are finally pulling their heads out of the sand and doing something. In the past, for minor soreness, a horse might have to stand hours in buckets of ice before a performance to make sure there was absolutely no trace of soreness...do you know how uncomfortable that is? A gram of bute would have been much easier on the horse!

For people who say no horse should be performing if it's not 100% sound-there are very very few horses, just like there are very few people, who don't have any problems whatsoever. No, I'm not condoning drugging up lame horses and making them work...I am condoning keeping basically sound horses sound longer, and making sure that minor aches and pains that come with regular work are allowed to be treated and the horse allowed to work as comfortably as possible.

I feel that the majority of people who support the former zero tolerance on drugs have either never had horses, have never had performance horses and have no idea what it takes to maintain a performance horse, or have had horses but never developed much knowledge about them and their health.

For those who say "well, a human knows what he's doing, a horse is having it done to him", I agree. The moment we take the horse off the prarie and put him in a stall, or even a large field with a fence, we change his life and start doing things to him, and we become responsible for him. The second we ride him, be it just around the field or over a grand prix course of fences at a show, we become responsible for them. We take away their ability to choose what they want to do, how much they want to do, and when they want to do it, and we start making them do what we want when we want.

When we do "stuff" to our horses, we ought to be able to maintain our horses so they can perform to the best of their ability-again, regardless of whether we expect them to perform a simple walk around the field or jumping a grand prix horse. It stands to reason a horse being expected to work at the top levels is going to need more maintenance than a horse who is only expected to walk around the field or trot down the road now and then. A person who jogs a mile once a week isn't going to need to go to the gym 6 days a week to work out to be in good enough shape to do that job-someone who runs marathons WILL need to be running and working out pretty much every day. The person who runs marathons is going to need a LOT more medical maintenance because there is going to be some wear an tear from repetitive motion, much less any injuries, than someone who just jogs a little here and there. It's allowed for us humans, it ought to be allowed for our other animals as well.

shanagarry

There has been a list of banned substances for many years now. Anyone who has received bans in the past did so because they broke the rules, simple as, but I'm not going any further into that discussion.

I agree with the removal of zero tolerance for bute so that a horse that has been treated and has recovered can return to work quicker. However, if you take the time to read latimeria's very informative contribution above, you will see that the level that they have set allows for a horse in active treatment to compete. That is ridiculous in my book.

As for horses picking up knocks and the like, yes of course they do. Can bute be beneficial in treatment - of course. Should it be used to get an animal through a competition - no way. The horse should be rested until it is completely right. And in terms of keeping a horse sound, the focus should be on preparation and management, not on a dependence on painkillers.

And for what it's worth (though frankly I found your comment quite patronising) I've owned and worked with performance horses for many years and bute has only ever been used to treat specific occurances, not for 'aches and pains' as you put them. Any competition horse that has aches and pains is not being managed correctly.

culna

finbarrk wrote: »

I was dissapointed in our top riders response to the initial ruling. Most of them were for it.

I am very disappointed with the mindset of some Irish international riders. They'd do anything for glory - cheats!!

Theponylady

I don't agree that a horse in active competition should never need bute. A heavy dose on a regular basis, absolutely not. But a gram the day before, particularly on an older horse, I think is therupetic, and isn't enough to hide a real problem.

I disagree that horses who suffer any aches and pains are being "mismanaged". In some cases, sure, that's true. But often there are older horses who are top notch horses who have been around for years, and who have the very important job of allowing someone an entry into the upper levels of a sport on an already been there done that horse. It allows those schoolmasters to go on for a while longer, while keeping them comfortable, until they need to be retired.

I'd rather see horses perform into their teens and be getting the best care and being allowed to perform at a level it took years to get to, and being ridden by one rider, rather than see them "retired", which too often means sold to someone else to be pounded into the ground at a lower level of competing. When minor treatment will no longer keep them sound and comfortable, then real retirement would be a more likely option. I have seen too many grand prix horses, in both dressage and jumping, who were supposedly "retired" because of very minor issues, who ended up working ten times harder after being sold on to amatuers, or used for upper level lessons, working much harder than they did when they were competing.

Theponylady

I sure wish we could reply in the box at the bottom of the page, to where we could see what we were replying to for referance:(

There never was an actual list of allowed or banned substances. There was a list of substances that people had already been caught using that were deemed to be not allowed. But there was no actual list saying what WAS allowed or at what doses, nor was there anything saying what levels of traces of banned substances were legal. There was no complete list of banned substances. You could use various things to treat illnesses or lamenesses, the horse may have been fine and back in work for weeks, yet traces of the substance would still show up weeks later when it was no longer affecting the horse. There were feed additives that would cause "positive" results, heck even a horse eating a chocolate bar right before an event could cause a "positive" test for caffine. Caffine is a stimulant, but the miniscule amounts in a candy bar were hardly affecting the horse's performance, and hardly constituted drugging. Yet I personally know one person who was set down for a number of months for "drugging" because her horse snagged a candy bar at a show, and was unlucky enough to be tested not long after eating it. Any official would agree that the amount of caffine was negligible and certainly wouldn't be affecting performance...but with the zero tolerance policy, it wasn't legal.

Zero tolerance in anything has never worked. It didn't work for prohibition, it hasn't worked in the "war on drugs", it hasn't worked in the FEI.

finbarrk

Are you sure there was never a list of banned substances from the FEI? I thought there was. And phenylbutazone was on it. There had to be a list.

shanagarry

Of course there is a list of banned substances, it's called the Equine Prohibited List I don't know exactly how long there has been one, but for many years. There are specific stated threshold levels for some substances, where they aren't stated the threshold is zero. Incidentally, they aren't pursuing any positive caffeine tests unless the results are abnormally high.

It might also be useful for some people to educate themselves by reading the rules.
Some key points:
- There are three classes of controlled substances, Doping, Medication A and Medication B. Medication B comprises substances where horses are particularly susceptible to unintentional contamination through ingestion or environment. The penalty for this is a warning and/or a small fine. So there is account taken of the fact that it is impossible to completely control what a horse might eat or be exposed to.

- You can apply for preapproval for any substance that is required for bona fide therapeutic treatment, so that gets around residual trace issues long after

- You can enter a defence of No Fault/No Negligence which doesn't excuse you the violation, but can reduce the penalty imposed.

So really, the vast majority of people being caught for doping violations aren't unlucky, they're careless, negligent in that they are ignorant of the rules, or just plain cheats. These rules aren't there to prevent horses getting medical treatment or make life difficult, they exist to protect horses and to keep equestrianism clean and fair.

There is also a prohibited list for riders, which a lot of people don't know about. You're supposed to notify if you use an asthma inhaler, for example.