GAINESVILLE- A horse has come down with a very contagious disease at a major horse show in Marion County.

One horse is confirmed positive for Equine Herpes and has been quarantined at UF's large animal hospital.
 
TV 20s Alex de Armas reports... a veterinarian and horse owners say more should have been done for the other horses.

 

Some horse owners are outraged at the fact that the show is still going on.

 

One horse owner told me she wasn't even told about the illness by officials.
 

Kristi Lindgren of Gainesville was planning on showing her horse in the "HITS" show in Ocala this weekend.

 

"I was only on the show ground for about three hours," said Kristi Lindgren, a horse owner. 
 

It wasn't until after she registered and paid for show fees that she learned one of the horses there was infected with Equine Herpes Virus, or EHV1… she was told by her trainer.

 

"I think that anybody would want to know who's shipping their horse onto a property if there's been a horse with a disease that could potentially kill your horse," said Lindgren.  

 

The horse was sent to the University of Florida's animal hospital.

 

The horse survived and is in stable condition.

 

HITS management says the tent the horse was in-- with 80 other horses-- was quarantined.

 

But a veterinarian in Alachua County says all horses that were on the show ground while that horse was there should remain there.
 
"And because it was spread through respiratory secretion, we worry because nose to nose contact is how it's spread. and you can imagine horses at a horse show, that's how they talk," said Dr. Erica Latcher, a veterinarian in Alachua County. 
 

If these horse owners' trainer wouldn't have told them about the infected horse at HITS, they would have left their horses at the show, picked them up, brought them back to the farm where they could have potentially infected the rest of the horses here.
 
"The state veterinarian has decided that they are not going to restrict movement at the facility at Ocala, and that's their decision to make," said Latcher.
 

Mark Fagan, spokesman for the Florida Department of Agriculture told me on the phone the lab tests confirmed the horse was positive on Wednesday and as of last night 7 different farms have been quarantined -- four in Ocala, one in St. Augustine, one in Tampa, and one in Wellington.

 

But this procedure still isn't enough for one horse owner.
 

"For us their health is more important than one more show at HITS, so we made the decision to not go," said Linda Grover, a horse owner. "I understand that there are large economic issues at risk, but if you are a horse owner, these animals, we love these animals. As a horse owner I'm offended that they did not inform her in anyway."
 
Dr. Latcher recommends that if your horse is already on the show ground then they should stay there.

 

But if the horse is at home with you, make sure to take their temperature twice a day and talk to your veterinarian.
 
As far as the quarantine process, the spokesperson for the Department of Agriculture told me it usually lasts 28 days if no clinical signs of disease appear.
 
He says to check their website regularly.