October
JulyDeath rate far from trifling
As a horse-racing enthusiast over more than half a century, a reader of Winning Post for many years, and an anti-jumps activist, I read Steve and Ceri Jostlear’s letter (Winning Post 4/7) with interest.
They suggest that a death rate of around one percent is trifling, and that "some would say that you shouldn’t let the truth get in the way of a good story". Well, here’s a different reading on that story.
If you add the acceptors for the meetings shown by Winning Post for Flemington-Rosehill-Morphettville-Eagle Farm-Belmont-Wangaratta last Saturday, the total is about 677.
Not all would have raced, so let’s work on 600. Applying that insignificant jumps fatality rate of one percent, that would mean one horse killed at each of the race meetings. Six horses dead is a trifling number?
Such a death rate would not be tolerated by the community. It would virtually mean that whenever you had a raceday a horse would be killed.
However, it’s not just the deaths that concern anti-jumps people. The appalling injuries jumps horses incur often cause people to wonder how jumps racing can be classed as "entertainment".
Similarly, Steve and Ceri, we don’t want horses to be sent to the knackery, but I’ll bet that many of the horses racing over jumps three or four years ago have already gone that way.
If you love them as much as you say, then look after them. It must cost far less to agist a horse than have it in training, or are they only "loved" as long as they can earn money?
Black Rock (Vic)