History and Guidelines of Program

In 1974 the Kentucky Department of Agriculture implemented a program to determine the occurrence of Equine Infectious Anemia (EIA) among Kentucky’s equine population.

Testing conducted during the late 1970's and into the 1980's annually identified between 120 and 150 animals as affected with EIA.

During the mid 80's and throughout the 90's an increased amount of attention was placed on stopping the spread of EIA amongst Kentucky’s equine population. Today in excess of 100,000 samples are tested annually with fewer than 5 animals being identified as affected with EIA.

Late in 2002 the Kentucky Department of Agriculture for the first time since its' inception amended the EIA Testing requirement from six (6) months to twelve (12) months for equine being offered for sale or changing ownership.

FOR THE PURPOSE OF MEETING STATE TESTING REQUIREMENTS THE KENTUCKY DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE REQUIRES THAT THE ANIMALS BE TESTED USING AN OFFICIAL TEST METHOD CONDUCTED BY A LABORATORY APPROVED BY THE USDA TO CONDUCT EIA TESTING.

Official Tests

The Kentucky State Board of Agriculture recognizes both the agar gel immunodiffusion (AGID) and the ELISA as official tests. When time permits, we encourage the use of the AGID test. Though not often, we have on occasion seen instances of "false positives" being reported when using the ELISA test. In addition the ELISA tests are not always recognized by some states as "official" and are not recognized as "official" tests for the purpose of exporting animals from the United States. In the event that an ELISA test is used for the interstate movement of an animal, we would encourage you to contact the state of destination to insure that the test is recognized.