“Consideration of new Equine Testing Lab” was item number one on the West Virginia Racing Commission’s July 28 agenda.
The Commission considered it and, reports the Blood-Horse, has chosen to retain a new lab to test equine samples. West Virginia will be the second state to oust Truesdail Laboratories in recent months, following in the footsteps of Indiana.
The move follows Indiana’s discovery that Truesdail missed seven positives in a 26-day period, including what would have been a Class 1 violation, the most serious type, for Ritalin. Two other labs correctly identified the seven positives, the state said.
Truesdail was the lab of choice for four mid-Atlantic states: Maryland, New Jersey, Delaware (which retained it this year to replace LGC Science), and West Virginia (which had hired it last August). West Virginia is the only one of the four to have fired Truesdail; two of the other states, New Jersey and Delaware, have publicly said they were exploring the creation of a quality assurance program to monitor Truesdail’s work.
West Virginia will retain Colorado-based Industrial Laboratories to conduct its testing program.
States participating in the national uniform medication program are required to employ labs accredited by the Racing Medication and Testing Consortium. Truesdail and Industrial are two of the five accredited labs.
