Sweet itch causes severe, chronic pruritus in horses hypersensitive to Culicoides midge bites, with significant welfare impacts from self-trauma and the extensive management required for relief.
Horses with sweet itch experience severe chronic pruritus that significantly impairs quality of life. The intense itch drives compulsive rubbing that causes hair loss, skin thickening, skin damage, and secondary bacterial infection. The skin changes accumulate over multiple seasons, causing permanent thickening and scarring in severely affected horses. Sleep disruption from nighttime biting and itching reduces rest quality and affects behavior. The behavioral expression of extreme itch, including frantic rubbing on any available surface, causes injury to fences and stabling as well as the horse itself. Without adequate management, affected horses experience months of ongoing severe discomfort each year throughout their lifetime.