Amid the outbreak of the deadly EHV-1 virus, it seems Virginia and Maryland are trying to pass the buck on, one from another, as to where the index horse–the first horse infected—originated, as West Virginia and Pennsylvania announced they would not accept horses from Virginia and Maryland on their race tracks.

“We do not believe the index horse came from St. Mary’s,” Sue duPont spokesperson for the Maryland Department of Agriculture, told The Bay Net. The mare had come from Virginia through Leesburg for treatment and was located at a facility in Hartford County to recover, DuPont said.

DuPont’s counterpart Elaine Lidholm, spokesperson at the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (VDACS), said any pointing out of an index horse at this point may at best be a guessing game.

According to Lidholm, the VDACS was hoping the index horse originated at the EMC, the largest hospital dedicated solely to horses in the commonwealth of Virginia. Lidholm avoided mentioning the origin of the horse. “This is what we are hoping for,” Lidholm said. Vets in Virginia believe if the index horse was not from the Marion duPont Scott Equine Medical Center (EMC), the outbreak of EHV-1 might be even more disastrous.

Lidholm confirmed Pennsylvania and West Virginia were not accepting horses from Maryland and Virginia on their race tracks.

Virginia also canceled all public horse sales and auctions throughout the Commonwealth through Monday, March 5, 2007.

Northern Virginia was identified as the worst affected by the outbreak.

In related developments, the Marion duPont Scott Equine Medical Center (EMC) at Leesburg officially announced Wednesday it was shutting down after two more horses have tested positive for Equine Herpesvirus Type 1 (EHV-1), bringing the total number of positive tests to three.

In Maryland, duPont said one farm in Hartford County – where the infected horse came to Leesburg from for recuperation – still remains under a hold order.  At two additional farms, one in each Carroll and Hartford counties, horses are being closely monitored at some stables.

DuPont said a total of 10 farms in Carroll and Charles counties were released from hold orders.

At the EMC, the two positively tested horses, including the one from St. Mary’s that was taken to the Virginia center on February 7, in addition to two other horses with suspected infections, are being held in the Biosafety Level 2 isolation unit at the EMC.

According to Nathaniel White, Director of the Marion duPont Scott Equine Medical Center, the decision to close the hospital was a difficult but necessary step to protect the center’s patients and the horses in the regional population. He said the quarantine was essential in preventing the spread of the EHV-1 virus.

Marjorie Musick, spokesperson for the EMC, said in all the center was talking about five horses, including the two whose test results were still awaited. The Virginia horse that was euthanized did have EHV-1 “but it did not die of the disease,” Musick explained.

The EMC suspects that the index horse had come from St. Mary’s County, though as a matter of policy they did not name the county as such. According to White, it is believed that the EHV-1 infection began when on Feb. 7, a horse admitted for an unrelated emergency– the one from St. Mary’s still in the isolation unit, although White did not identify the sick horse– subsequently underwent surgery