A US Endurance Horse has escaped sanction after the International Equestrian Federation (FEI) accepted that an adverse analytical finding (AAF) for an anti-depressant was most likely caused by contaminated sewage from a Girl Guide camp. In October last year, the FEI suspended FYF Dutch and its rider, Nicki Meuten, after the endurance horse returned an AAF for O-Desmethyl Venlafaxine, an anti-depressant banned under the FEI’s equine anti-doping regulations. 

In the FEI decision (PDF below), Robert Gielen, Ride Coordinator of the 2 July event in Coates Creek at which FYF Dutch tested positive (AAF), outlined that the trial for the event passed through “at least one field where human sludge… i.e. sewage, is dumped heavily”. Gielen confirmed that the site of the ride camp is at a Girl Guide camp, with a huge septic field where many of the horses had grazed.

Standing pools of septic water were right next to one of the trails used for the ride, as well as a sign warning about sewage from the Girl Guide site. Meuten said that she had not allowed her horse to graze there, but had allowed her to eat grass and consume water from other points along the trial.

The concentration of O-Desmethyl Venlafaxine in the horse’s urine sample was 9 ng/mL. ‘Based on the submissions, the FEI finds that in accordance with the opinion of the expert Professor Paine, an environmental contamination of the water or the grass that the horse ingested at the Event is the most likely source of the substance O-Desmethyl Venlafaxine’, concluded the FEI decision.