About PMU
The PMU farms first came about in the early 1930s-40s when a company by
the name of Wyeth Ayerst began creating pills called Premarin, which
are post-menopausal pills basically to help get rid of the many issues
and symptoms that come with menopause for women. The drug was first
introduced in 1942 to the public by the way. Word of where the
“ingredients” were coming from honestly first made its appearance when
the organization called “HorseAid” first made a two year study into the
PMU Farms in 1987, PMU standing for Pregnant Mare’s Urine, which is
where the main ingredient came from. Because there wasn’t many research
studies, bad symptoms popping up as of yet or just the fact that it was
a new approved drug, it became huge with women both in the U.S. and
Canada and the PMU ranching facilities grew to the hundreds. (You’re
currently looking at roughly 440 of them that are still active today
and pumping out pregnant mare’s urine).
Basically what a PMU farm is is a ranching facility. It’s run by
ranching personnel and each individual ranch carries roughly anywhere
from a couple hundred to a couple thousand mares. In able to collect
the urine, the ranching facilities run on a strict monthly schedule and
all facilities are run under strict contract with Wyeth Ayerst and are
inspected monthly by Laboratory inspectors
and vets hired by Wyeth Ayerst (hence where the bias first
begins). Since the pills and creams of Premarin, Prempro and Premphase
require high concentrated amounts of estrogen, the urine collected from
the mares needs to be highly concentrated, which can honnestly only be
acheived by using pregnant mares and by limitting the amount of water
or other liquids consumed aka reducing the amount of water allowed for
mares. The urine collection starts in early October of each year, where
each individual mare that has been impregnated in the early months of
June and July by live coverage will be turned into and confined to
small stalls inside the barn and fitted with collection pouches fitted
around their posterior and vulva. Their water supply is cut off to a
minimum given twice daily at least and due to the lack of flexibility
in the pouch straps, mares are also forced to stay standing and can’t
be taken out of the barn, unless once a week to exercise, until
collection ends around the month of March. By that month, the pmu mares
are turned out to pasture to prepare for foaling, which takes place
around the months of April and May, and left out to pasture with their
foals throughout the spring and summer months. They are impregnated
again in June and collection starts again.
The PMU Farms are also run by a minimal code of standard also known
as the Recommended Code of Practice, which was set by NEARIC (The North
American Equestrian Ranching Information Council), which allows them to
follow the routine with the minimal stall requirements, limitted water
use and limitted amount of exercise offered to the pregnant mares.
NAERIC by the way is an organization which represents most if not all
PMU ranching facilities even to this day and are basically literally in
conjunction to Wyeth Ayerst.
After having further done more research on NAERIC, I learned some
pretty interesting facts one being that according to them (and this
includes percentages for all ranching facilities): 55% of the foals are
sent to the international meat markets when mature, however…that
doesn’t seem to be the case with the amount of PMU mares and foals that
have been clottering the slaughter houses and rescue facilities and the
lovely percentages they also provide. Most if not all foals tend to go
to the meat markets and slaughter houses and no they are not mature, as
well as most fillies will be impregnated as soon as they are old enough
to carry (that is IF they are kept on the farm). PMU mares that can’t
be impregnated anymore are also sold to meat markets or slaughter
houses.
