ISA in Canada - 2013, 2014

Sadly, here is the ISA in Canada in the past year and a half. ISA is the worst disease of farmed fish. It originated in Norway, where Marine Harvest, Cermaq and Grieg Seafood are from. It was a freshwater virus that fish farms picked up and became a saltwater virus.

Then it has been spread to most of the rest of the world, for example, Chile, where Aquagen took it for the other Norwegian companies, and then sued the Norwegian scientist Are Nylund (one of two global labs for determining ISA) for determining that it had transferred it to the South Pacific Ocean on salmon eggs. This is why the world knows that Aquagen took it to Chile as Nylund was not found to be incorrect, and news coverage followed the case. Had there been no case, no one would have known it had been transferred, fish farms are that secretive. Aquagen made a mistake.

Chile then had a $2 billion fish farm meltdown - a quarter of a billion dead fish, and local tribes people lost 13,000 to 26, 000 jobs - and has never been clear of ISA since 2008. Norway has had ISA since the '80s when the fish farms propagated it. For example, July 10, 2014, ISA was identified in Norway: http://www.thefishsite.com/fishnews/23571/cermaq-detects-isa-virus-at-langyhovden-farm.

You will note, below, where the Canadian Food Inspection Agency says certain strains are not known to cause disease. There are two things to be said about this: the CFIA was shown not to be able to find ISA due to its lab shortcomings during the Cohen Commission, and they have simply ignored the 1200 page document; and ISA is propagated on fish, reproducing until it turns into a virulent strain. No fish farms, no ISA in our oceans.

ISA kills wild Pacific salmon and should not have been allowed into BC by DFO in the 1980s and 1990s. There is plenty of science now that confirms, sadly, that ISA is in BC - Kibenge, Nylund, Miller, for example. Only DFO, the CFIA and fish farms maintain the fiction that ISA is not in BC.

The global pattern for fish farms is to deny ISA is present, and then finally, when they can claim nothing differently: "Oh, well, darn, ISA is here now, we'll just have to learn to live with it." We in BC expect more of our governments and government agencies, but we are not getting it.

The CFIA budget, for example, is $740 million. It can simply ignore a small $26 Million commission that took three years and the December diseases testimony - this is in the transcripts and video - into fish farm diseases, and the CFIA shortcomings, it's poor Kim Klotins, cornered into having to admit the CFIA doesn't want to find ISA because it ruins the export possibilities of farmed salmon. It just ignores this on-the-record evidence of its refusal to admit ISA is in BC.

2013

Dec 6      NL*
Dec 5      NL*
Nov 7      NL
Oct 25     NB*
Oct 25     NB*
Oct 18     NB*
Oct 10     NB*
July 26     NL*
July 15     NB*
July 4       NL
July 4       NL
Jun  5       NL
May 29     NL*
May 29     NL*
Apr 12      NL&L*
Apr 12      NL&L*
Jan 10      NB*

2014

Jun 23     NB*
Jun 23     NB*
Jun 23     NS*
May 27   NB*
Feb 2      NB*

Here is the CFIA link for you to look for yourself: http://www.inspection.gc.ca/animals/aquatic-animals/diseases/reportable/2014/eng/1339174937153/1339175227861.