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M O N D AY, N O V E M B E R 06- N O V E M B E R 12, 2023
V I S I T M O N T E R E Y PA R K P R E S S . C O M
V O L. 11,
N O. 145
Thousands attend 2-day Breeders’ Cup Championships at Santa Anita Park
How a big pharma company stalled a potentially lifesaving vaccine in pursuit of bigger profits
By City News Service
By Anna Maria Barry-Jester, ProPublica
T
housands of horseracing aficionados, curious spectators and enthusiastic bettors descended Friday on Santa Anita Park in Arcadia for the beginning of the two-day Breeders’ Cup World Championships, one of the sport’s most prestigious gatherings of horses, trainers and owners from around the world. For Santa Anita, this year’s gathering marked the record 11th time the track has hosted the event. “Santa Anita’s outstanding reputation and scenic venue provide us with the ideal setting to continue to grow our audience by combining the best that racing, hospitality, and entertainment have to offer,” Breeders’ Cup President/ CEO Drew Fleming said last year when announcing the track would be hosting the 2023 event. Organizers said a report prepared in 2017 showed that the event can have a nearly $100 million impact on the local economy, given its worldwide industry attraction. Santa Anita last hosted the Breeders’ Cup in 2019. In 2021 it was at Del Mar Thoroughbred Club in San Diego County. Last year’s event was at Keeneland in Lexington, Kentucky. Organizers said 175 horses were entered for the 40th Breeders’ Cup World Championships, with races scheduled over two days, anchored by the $6 million Longines Breeders’ Cup Classic on Saturday. Friday’s first post was scheduled for 11:30 a.m., beginning with four undercard races. The first Breeders’ Cup race Friday was the $1 million Juvenile Turf Sprint, set for about 2 p.m., followed by the $2 million Juvenile Fillies, the $1 million
to have been a cardiac event. Practical Move was returning from a workout on the track when the event occurred. Another Breeders’ Cup Classic entry, Arcangelo, dropped out of the race Tuesday due to an issue with the colt’s left hind foot. In remarks posted on social media from Santa Anita, trainer Jena Antonucci confirmed the issue with the horse’s foot that “he’s not fully resolving, and we’re running out of time” to successfully treat the problem before the race. Kentucky Derby winner Mage had been expected to run in the Breeders’ Cup Classic but never made the trip to Santa Anita “after spiking a fever last weekend,” ESPN reported.
This story was originally published by ProPublica. ProPublica is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom. Sign up for The Big Story newsletter to receive stories like this one in your inbox. ver since he was a medical student, Dr. Neil Martinson has confronted the horrors of tuberculosis, the world’s oldest and deadliest pandemic. For more than 30 years, patients have streamed into the South African clinics where he has worked — migrant workers, malnourished children and pregnant women with HIV — coughing up blood. Some were so emaciated, he could see their ribs. They’d breathed in the contagious bacteria from a cough on a crowded bus or in the homes of loved ones who didn’t know they had TB. Once infected, their best option was to spend months swallowing pills that often carried terrible side effects. Many died. So, when Martinson joined a call in April 2018, he was anxious for the verdict about a tuberculosis vaccine he’d helped test on hundreds of people. The results blew him away: The shot prevented over half of those infected from getting sick; it was the biggest TB vaccine breakthrough in a century. He hung up, excited, and waited for the next step, a trial that would determine whether the shot was safe and effective enough to sell. Weeks passed. Then months. More than five years after the call, he’s still waiting, because the company that owns the vaccine decided to prioritize far more lucrative business. Pharmaceutical giant GSK pulled back on its global public health work and leaned into serving the world’s most-profitable market, the United States, which CEO Emma Walmsley recently called its “top priority.” As the London-based company turned away from its vaccine for TB, a disease that kills 1.6 million mostly poor people each year, it went all in on a vaccine against shingles, a viral infection that comes with a painful rash. It afflicts mostly older people who, in the U.S., are largely covered by government insurance. Importantly, the shingles vaccine shared a key ingredient with the TB shot, a component that enhanced the effectiveness of both but was in limited supply. From a business standpoint, GSK’s decision made sense. Shingrix would become what the company calls a “crown jewel,” raking in more than $14 billion since 2018. But the ability of a corporation to allow a potentially lifesaving vaccine to languish lays bare the distressing reality of public health vaccine creation. With limited resources, governments have long seen no other option but to team with Big Pharma to develop vaccines for global scourges. But after the governments pump taxpayer money and resources into the efforts, the companies get control of the products, locking up ownership and prioritizing their own gain. That’s what GSK did with the TB vaccine. Decades ago, the U.S. Army brought in GSK to work on a malaria vaccine and helped develop the ingredient that would prove game-changing for the company. It was an adjuvant, a
See Breeders’ Cup Page 27
See Pharma Page 14
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| Photo courtesy of the Breeders’ Cup World Championships/Facebook
Juvenile Fillies Turf, the $2 million Juvenile and the $1 million Juvenile Turf. A total of 10 races were on the schedule for Friday. Saturday’s 12-race card was set to begin at 10:10 a.m., with the first Breeders’ Cup race being the third post at about 11:30 a.m. — the $1 million Dirt Mile. Also on tap Saturday were the $2 million Filly & Mare Turf, the $1 million Filly & Mare Sprint, the $2 million Breeders’ Cup Mile, the $2 million Distaff, the $4 million Breeders’ Cup Turf and the marquee race, the $6 million Breeders’ Cup Classic, expected around 3:40 p.m. It was followed by the $1 million Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint and the $2 million Breeders’ Cup Sprint. Results of the weekend’s races are available on HeySoCal.com. USA Network and
FanDuel TV provided coverage of Friday’s races. USA provided early coverage Saturday, giving way to NBC and Peacock starting at 12:30 p.m. Saturday covering five races, including the Breeders’ Cup Classic. The races also streamed on BreedersCup. com and other Breeders’ Cup social media channels. The week leading up to the big event was marred by a pair of horse deaths. On Wednesday, Geaux Rocket Ride — a 3-year-old colt who was set to run in the Breeders’ Cup Classic — was euthanized after failing to recover from surgery to repair a leg injury suffered while training at Santa Anita last weekend. On Tuesday, Practical Move, a 3-year-old colt that was entered in the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile, died at Santa Anita of what is suspected