Horse Tips
From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 1993:
Reporters Rans Pierson of The New York Post and Phillip
Nalbone of the Wall Street Journal recently followed Phyllis Orrick of
the New York Press in amplifying ANIMAL PEOPLE’s April and
July/August exposes of the treatment of horses in making the estrogen
supplement Premarin. Up to 75,000 pregnant mares spend half of each
year catheterized for urine collection and confined to narrow stalls;
most of their foals are sold to slaughter. Their numbers could triple
when the manufacturer, Ayerst Organics Inc., completes expansion of
its urine processing plant in Brandon, Manitoba, Canada. According
to Pierson, more than eight million American women take Premarin
for menopausal symptoms. Costing half as much as synthetic alterna-
tives made by Ciba Pharmaceuticals, Mead Johnson, and Abbott
Labs, Premarin holds 80% of the estrogen supplement market, and is
now the most prescribed drug in the U.S. An Ayerst spokesperson said
the number of horses involved is much lower than the 75,000 estimate
produced by longtime estrogen industry observer Tom Hughes of the
Canadian Farm Animal Care Trust, adding that the firm isn’t responsi-
ble for the fate of the foals anyhow. Medical columnist Zoltan Rona,
M.D., meanwhile argued in the July issue of Alive magazine that
menopausal women could avoid needing estrogen supplements by
avoiding meat and taking appropriate vitamins, minerals, and herbs.