Results from the first round of Hendra tests for horses quarantined at a far north Queensland property are due this weekend.
Thirty-six horses at the Blazing Saddles trail riding property west of Cairns are being monitored after a horse died from the virus on July 11.
Biosecurity Queensland’s chief veterinarian Dr Rick Symons said more horses on the property could test positive.
“It’s not easy to transmit the disease and therefore it’s unusual to have a lot of cases within one property, but it’s certainly possible that one or more of the horses could be positive,” he told reporters on Friday.
It will be a month before the animals are cleared completely.
Seventy-six horses are being monitored around the state and nine horses infected with Hendra have died or been put down since June 20.
Six were in Queensland and three in NSW.
Dr Symons said while the virus was carried by flying foxes, people could not catch it directly from bats.
“There’s no evidence at all that it moves from flying foxes to humans or humans to humans – it’s only from flying foxes to horses,” he said.
“So our advice is to keep your horses away from flying fox colonies.”
Removing flying foxes from communities could make the problem worse by stressing the bats and causing them to shed more of the virus, he said.
“It increases the risk, (and) if you move them they can move back, and if they move, they move to someone else’s property, so although I can understand people’s concern about it, it is not a solution,” he said.
AAP TURF
