LANSING – Snow falls. Temperatures plummet. ‘Tis the season to worry about herpes.

For horses.

Michigan Racing Commissioner Christine White has issued an order requiring all horses housed in racing stables to be vaccinated against equine herpes virus.

The directive covers all horses stabled in six pari-mutuel tracks with live betting – Great Lakes Downs in Muskegon County, Hazel Park Harness Raceway in Oakland County, Northville Downs in Wayne County, Jackson Harness Raceway in Jackson County, Sports Creek Raceway in Genesee County and Mount Pleasant Meadows in Isabella County.

The commissioner issued the order after consulting state Veterinarian Steven Halstead.

“For humans, herpes is associated with sexual contact,” said Halstead. “For horses, the virus infects the respiratory tract, from the nose to the windpipe and all the way to the bottom of the lungs.”

“Just like people who catch colds during winter months, cold weather puts horses at greater risk of contracting herpes.”

Equine herpes is highly contagious and can be can be transmitted through sneezing, coughing and sharing equipment such as feeding buckets and bits that come in contact with the horses’ saliva and nose.

The order applies to all horses stabled at the tracks whether or not they actually race.

While White’s directive covers only racing facilities, Dr. Jim Connell of the Town & Country Animal Hospital in Allegan City recommends vaccinating all horses.

“If you have a stable of 11 horses, it takes only one infected horse to sneeze to the left and its neighbor will be at risk of getting herpes,” Connell said. “And when the second horse passes it down the line, you could have an outbreak.”

During inoculation, the vaccine can be sprayed up the nose through a reed-thin, six-inch plastic tube or injected, Connell said, adding that the process takes only two to three minutes.

“To murder a quote from Ben Franklin: The $15 to $20 spent in vaccination prevention can save thousands of dollars in cure and lost income,” said Connell who treats horses in Kalamazoo, Van Buren, Allegan, Kent, Ottawa and Barry counties.

Although it costs only $400 to $500 to treat a racehorse for herpes, the owner could forgo thousands of dollars in winnings because the horse won’t be able to race for six weeks, Connell said.

For pleasure and show horses, the price owners pay is loss of company of their horses while it is sick, he added.

Dominic Perrone, an analyst at the Office of the Racing Commissioner, said that losses from horse herpes could run up to millions of dollars because an outbreak can close down a racetrack for weeks.

An outbreak at Northville Downs last year led to the cancellation of 15 racing days, and live betting revenues for the track decreased from $3.6 million in 2004 to $2.1 million in 2005, Perrone said.

“That’s just one racetrack,” Perrone said, “If we have herpes outbreaks in other tracks then there would be an enormous negative impact on the industry.”

 Halstead said that aside from possible loss of revenue, another good reason to vaccinate is that herpes can cause a horse a lot of suffering.

“After being infected with herpes, a horse develops a high fever,” Halstead said. “It will cough and sneeze, have a hard time breathing, have poor appetite and get depressed.

“You have to think of the horse in human terms. You feel terrible when you have a high fever. A horse feels that way, too.”