Horses die because they're stupid.
Most creatures need rest to heal when their legs break.
Horses don't understand the concept of rest equaling healing.
They only experience pain = struggle = broken leg = more pain = more struggle = breaking even the healthy leg in the process—a stupid cycle they can't solve on their own, requiring human intervention.
And a horse, being a giant beast...
Especially for animals like racehorses that require treatment, they generally weigh over half a ton. (Previously, the claim of a ton was criticized.)
Horses can't lie still overnight. Think of a paralyzed person; they need to be turned over frequently to avoid bedsores. Horses, weighing 4-6 times more than humans, suffer even more from prolonged lying down. From their eyes and skin to their internal organs, everything can become necrotic.
You can try turning over your sleeping dad/boyfriend/best buddy (who usually weighs less than 200 pounds). How many times can you turn them if they don't cooperate?
But turning over a horse... even if the horse doesn't struggle at all, how many times can a caregiver do it?
And as mentioned before, horses are stupid; any movement hurts them. Their way of dealing with pain is: run.
This means that if you turn them over incorrectly, you'll find a broken-legged horse lying dead not far from the stable the next day.
To solve this problem, experts have pushed their imaginations to the limit:
Anyway, reducing the horse's leg use would greatly alleviate the problem, but... the cost is too high, and it's more prone to infection. I don't even know if spending all that money will guarantee a cure. The cure rate isn't very high, anyway.
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