Barbaro loses fight for life
Roy Jackson, co-owner of the colt who was injured last May 20 at the Preakness Stakes, said Barbaro was put down yesterday morning after his front legs began to show signs of stress following treatment on both hind legs.
“We just reached a point where it was going to be difficult for him to go on without pain,” Jackson said. “It was the right decision.”
Combined with the right hind leg he broke in three places during the race and the left hind leg that developed laminitis during treatment, the pain to the horse was too great to continue the extraordinary life-saving effort.
“He started to have changes in the front feet,” Jackson said. “Now we were dealing with all four feet. We were all concurrent on everything that we just don’t want the horse to suffer.”
“It’s a sad situation because we had some bright periods. It looked like we might make it through the thing — too much weight on the legs like that. It was going to be a long, long road. It was better not to go any further.”
