Kentucky's ongoing attempt to end racing in state proceeds..

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by cmorioles

Again, those that need it, sure. 99%, I don't think so. Even so, that is a contact sport so I'm not sure it is a good comparison. How about track and field. That seems A LOT more reasonable. How many of them are injected on the day of competition? 99%?

What is track and field? Never heard of it...

I find it hard to understand that if you believe lasix is a performance enhancer that you would want a small percentage of horses to benefit. The entire reason that the standards were relaxed is that pretty much every horse has some degree of bleeding at some point. Well that and the racing commissions love to save money so it is easier to not have the state vet check every bleeding episode...

[cmorioles]

Originally Posted by Cannon Shell

What is track and field? Never heard of it...

I find it hard to understand that if you believe lasix is a performance enhancer that you would want a small percentage of horses to benefit. The entire reason that the standards were relaxed is that pretty much every horse has some degree of bleeding at some point. Well that and the racing commissions love to save money so it is easier to not have the state vet check every bleeding episode...

Like I said, as a bettor, I don't care. All I am saying is it isn't the easy decision that both sides seem to think it is. I find it hard to believe that every horse has bleeding and that all bleeding, no matter how microscopic, is an issue.

Let me ask you this, while it does help with bleeding, doesn't dehydrating a horse before sending it out to race have some negative effects? I can't imagine there is another sport where the participant is dehydrated before competing.

[OTM Al]

Originally Posted by cmorioles

Let me ask you this, while it does help with bleeding, doesn't dehydrating a horse before sending it out to race have some negative effects? I can't imagine there is another sport where the participant is dehydrated before competing.

The very reason I pay no attention to weight assignments. How much water weight is shed by each horse? Sure drugs have slightly different effects on horses just like they do people.

[Riot]

The dehydration effect of 1 injection of lasix is only about .5 to 1.5% of body weight.

Rarely clinically significant or of concern, and it matches the body weight loss in horses overseas that do not get lasix and sweat more, losing buckets of weight in sweat.

When the veterinary medical community tells the racing industry that lasix should be allowed for the health and welfare of the race horse, you'd think they'd listen to the horse health professionals.

Sad some simply choose to simply ignore that.

[OTM Al]

Originally Posted by Riot

The dehydration effect of 1 injection of lasix is only about .5 to 1.5% of body weight.

Rarely clinically significant or of concern, and it matches the body weight loss in horses overseas that do not get lasix and sweat more, losing buckets of weight in sweat.

When the veterinary medical community tells the racing industry that lasix should be allowed for the health and welfare of the race horse, you'd think they'd listen to the horse health professionals.

Sad some simply choose to simply ignore that.

So as you point out that is between 6 and 18 pounds on a 1200 lb animal, which is entirely gone before the race even begins as opposed to sweating it out along the way as well as after the race is well over. So how much does a pound in the saddle really mean?

[Riot]

Originally Posted by OTM Al

So as you point out that is between 6 and 18 pounds on a 1200 lb animal, which is entirely gone before the race even begins as opposed to sweating it out along the way as well as after the race is well over. So how much does a pound in the saddle really mean?

First, no that weight is not "entirely gone" before the race begins. The horses continue to sweat weight out during the race. That is post-lasix race weight hours after the race (which includes urination after the race)

What does a pound in the saddle have to do with blood volume?? They are two different things. The horse isn't losing muscle mass.

We could look at the results of the scientific study where they ran the horses replacing the weight the horse lost due to lasix, to see if "weight loss" due to lasix changed anything.

Would you like to see that?

[OTM Al]

Originally Posted by Riot

First, no that weight is not "entirely gone" before the race begins. The horses continue to sweat weight out during the race. That is post-lasix race weight hours after the race (which includes urination after the race)

What does a pound in the saddle have to do with blood volume?? They are two different things.

We could look at the results of the scientific study where they ran the horses replacing the weight the horse lost due to lasix, to see if "weight loss" due to lasix changed anything.

Would you like to see that?

I'm talking about weight and nothing more. Got my own feelings about where that water loss comes from when it is drug induced vs sweating from practical and observational experience, but am no vet and am not going to argue on one side or the other of this agenda driven debate.

[Riot]

Originally Posted by OTM Al

I'm talking about weight and nothing more. Got my own feelings about where that water loss comes from when it is drug induced vs sweating from practical and observational experience, but am no vet and am not going to argue on one side or the other of this agenda driven debate.

This debate is agenda-driven by the welfare of racing horses, and what is best for their health, as far as I am concerned.

Lasix a loop diuretic that acts on the kidney. It makes you form urine via osmosis.

We have a very long history and frequent common use in people and animals, with reams of pharmacologic research. We know virtually everything about this drug. So have lots of experience in exactly what water is lost when a person or animal gets a lasix shot.

It is first intravascular water from blood plasma, and as that is lowered, extracellular water is drawn into blood plasma. That's "free water" sitting in tissues between cells. Not within the cells. But one shot of lasix doesn't affect extracellular water, and barely affects plasma water.

That is why lasix is used for lung edema and hypertension in congestive heart failure in humans, to decrease lung secretions in some pneumonias, and to decrease EIPH in race horses.

Here's the thing: as soon as the businessman leaders of racing start talking about the pharmacologic medical effects of lasix, and using those as arguments, they have to defer to the far more educated medical veterinary world to tell them how the drug works. Some refuse to do that if the medical facts go against their goal or opinion. That's absurd. The only interest the veterinary world has in this fight is the welfare of the horse.

Vets sit at the sidelines of this fight, puzzled, offering up the scientific truth to the horse world about what lasix does and doesn't do when they are asked, and giving results of the hundreds of thousands of dollars of research on lasix in race horses we have done - and then sit while lay people unhappy with the results science has found argue with what they learn as if it's debatable, as if simply denying it can make it false, and using animal rights activists and personal opinion as counters to science.

There is opinion. There is fact. They are different. There is considered opinion formed after full exposure to the facts. But denying facts exist in order to continue to hold an opinion is exactly what some in the racing industry are doing now, and that's stupid.