South African news outlets have reported the European Union (EU) could lift a ban it imposed on South African horses in 2004. According to an article in the March 16 online edition of The Citizen (www.citizen.co.za/index/article.aspx?pDesc=14496,1,22), Racing South Africa said the ban, which was enacted after an outbreak of African horse sickness (AHS) was detected in early 2004, could be lifted as early as the end of March. A Feb. 28 AHS outbreak in George (in the southeast region of the Western Cape) is not expected to affect the lifting of the ban, since the current cases are 400 km (almost 250 miles) from the nation’s AHS-free zone, where equine exports to the EU would be permissible if the ban is lifted.

Peter Gibson, chief executive of Racing South Africa (a commercial company made up of racing operators, owners, and breeders) told the publication, “If the controlled area remains free of AHS by then, we are expecting the EU to lift the suspension.”

African horse sickness is spread by Culicoides midges. Affected animals can show clinical signs ranging from pulmonary distress to heart failure, and the disease is usually fatal in horses. Owners outside the free area and its surrounding surveillance zone are encouraged to vaccinate their horses against the disease. Currently, AHS is contained to its namesake continent where nine serotypes of the disease circulate. (For more information on AHS, visit www.TheHorse.com/emag.aspx?id=5683.)

South Africa has an AHS-control zone that covers the Western Cape, with three sub zones–an AHS-free zone (the metropolitan area of Cape Town, which is at the southwestern tip of the country), a surveillance zone, and a protection zone. Cases in the surveillance zone change the status of the free-zone, so in February 2004, when AHS was detected in Elsenberg, which is in the surveillance zone about 40 km from the free zone, and vaccination was introduced in the surveillance zone to prevent spread of disease, the European Union banned movement of horses from South Africa