PRV: DFO Doesn't do Evidence and Science, nor Precautionary Principle

As we all know, DFO likes to say it uses 'evidence and science' to make decisions. Well the PRV case is one where it refuses to test fish, refuses to act in accordance with a court decision requiring it to change policy and test for PRV (twice), and has now put off the decision until the month of the federal election, October, in Canada, by saying it will consult with Indigenous people - even though they had four months from the Feb decision to do so, and didn't.

Here is the June 4th take: https://www.facebook.com/alexandra.morton.1671/posts/2469478909947322

Here is one of several posts I have done on DFO refusal to use evidence and science: https://fishfarmnews.blogspot.com/2019/05/dfo-does-not-use-evidence-and-science.html.

Here is another on refusal to use E&S: https://fishfarmnews.blogspot.com/2019/02/evidence-and-science-based-decisions-at.html.

And a third on refusal to use E&S: https://fishfarmnews.blogspot.com/2019/02/transparency-in-fish-farming-well-no.html.

These three list more than a dozen cases of refusal to use E&S by DFO. I can go back in my files and find many others, but feel that a dozen cases prove the point.

Now, moving on, is it just me or do you think they will take a negative decision - as in more non-evidence and more non-science so close to the election? Sorry to be cynical, but it is unlikely this case is moving forward in 2019. Let's all vote Green and boot the Liberals out of BC. They know they are going to lose Alberta, but they may well lose BC, too. (Kinder Morgan, Bill C-48, killing off wild salmon and killer whales...).

Now, here is some history about the PRV case worked on by Ecojustice: https://www.ecojustice.ca/case/protecting-wild-salmon-from-piscine-reovirus/.

"Specifically, Ecojustice said, the minister’s practice contravened Section 56 of the Fishery (General) Regulations, which states that the minister cannot issue a transfer licence for fish that “have any disease or disease agent that may be harmful to the protection and conservation of fish.” The Federal Court agreed.

"In a 200-page decision issued in February 2019, the court ruled that the minister’s PRV policy is illegal for several reasons. Critically, it found that the PRV policy does not comply with the precautionary principle. This important principle says that, whenever possible, harm to human health and nature must be prevented before it happens — particularly in situations in which scientific understanding of potential risks is incomplete.

In its decision, the court gave the minister four months to come up with a new, precautionary, and science-based policy. That is the June 4, 2019 date they have just passed doing nothing except sending in DFO lawyers to extend 'consultations' to October.

And do remember that BC is the only jurisdiction on the Pacific coast that allows fish farms in the water. Alaska, Oregon, California have none, and Washington outlawed them after the Cooke Aquaculture escape of 263,000 Atlantics in 2017. 

Here is some more: "PRV is highly contagious and research shows that it is present in up to 80 per cent of farmed salmon."

Now, "The court’s decision in this case made it clear that, in order to do this [protect wild salmon], the minister must use a precautionary and science-based approach to protecting wild salmon — especially when there is a risk of transmitting a potentially deadly virus or disease."

This, below, is the evidence and science for the PRV/HSMI, jaundice/anemia in BC, by, DFO scientists no less, but DFO ignores this further case of E&S - it includes Di Cicco and Miller et al, among other scientists.


"Abstract

Piscine orthoreovirusStrain PRV-1is the causative agent of heart and skeletal muscle inflammation (HSMI) in Atlantic salmon(Salmo salar). Given its high prevalence in net pen salmon, debate has arisen on whether PRV poses a risk to migratory salmon, especially in British Columbia (BC) where commercially important wild Pacific salmon are in decline. Various strains of PRV have been associated with diseases in Pacific salmon, including erythrocytic inclusion body syndrome (EIBS), HSMI-like disease,and jaundice/anemia in Japan, Norway, Chile and Canada. We examine the developmental pathway of HSMI and jaundice/anemia associated with PRV-1 in farmed Atlantic and Chinook (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) salmon in BC, respectively. Insituhybridizationlocalized PRV-1 within developing lesions in both diseases. The two diseases showed dissimilar pathological pathways, with inflammatory lesions in heart and skeletal muscle in Atlantic salmon, and degenerative-necrotic lesions in kidney and liver in Chinook salmon, plausibly explained by differences in PRV load tolerance in red blood cells. Viral genome sequencing revealed no consistent differences in PRV-1variantsintimately involved in the development of both diseases, suggesting that migratory Chinook salmon may be at more than a minimal risk of disease from exposure to the high levels of PRV occurring on salmon farms."

This is the link to the PRV/HSMI paper: https://www.psf.ca/sites/default/files/ISH%20Manuscript%20%2B%20Suppl%20mat.pdf.

Moving on, the Vancouver Sun had this to say about the victory for wild salmon: "The court ruling stated that PRV is a highly infectious virus, first discovered in Norway in 2010. It is now also present in waters off the UK, Ireland, Chile, the U.S. and Canada. It is found in B.C. in both wild and farmed salmon."

This is the Sun link, Feb 2019: https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/court-quashes-government-policy-not-to-test-baby-farmed-salmon-for-disease.

The Sun gives you a take for the general reader, so for most it is worthwhile reading.

So, we have established that PRV is nasty, DFO won't test for it, and it's unlikely they will get to this before the October federal election -  after all there are hundreds of thousands of BC residents against fish farms. 

And, who is for fish farms you ask? Well, the total employment is 1,800 according to the BC government's own statistics in the BC Stats Report update to 2019. That is about half of one percent, as in less than 1% of those against fish farms.

See: https://fishfarmnews.blogspot.com/2019/03/mar-21-2019-bc-stats-report-2016.html.

Now, the final thing is getting a better handle on what the precautionary principle means.
 
Fortunately, in the BC Agriculture Minister's finfish committee (it had fish farms on it) Tony Allard, who is a lawyer, wrote a good long piece on the principle, in their voluminous report. Lots of arguing in this committee, I'll bet.

Here is my summary of his take on the precautionary principle: https://fishfarmnews.blogspot.com/2018/10/precautionary-principle-has-defined.html. 

You can read it for a shortened and to the point take, and then go to the whole version if you want more pain, er, depth.

And here is what it means:  

Allard's summary: "The precautionary principle does more than forbid decision makers from using scientific uncertainty as an excuse for regulatory inaction. It requires decision makers to err on the side of caution by anticipating harm and taking protective measures when there is environmental risk, even if there is scientific uncertainty."

After the east coast cod collapse (a lot like what is happening in BC now with the west coast salmon collapse, and DFO in Ottawa): "The Oceans Act was passed in 1996 to ensure that such a catastrophe never occurred again in Canada. The Oceans Act extended Canada’s jurisdiction over marine waters and required an ecosystem approach to the management of the marine environment based on the precautionary principle"

And: Allard points out that: "Canada’s Policy for the Conservation of Wild Salmon expressly requires the precautionary principle to be applied with respect to the conservation of wild salmon"

And: "The precautionary approach, defined in the Oceans Act as “erring on the side of caution,” is a key principle to be applied in the management of ocean activities."

And: "...the framework that government must use includes the following: "The application of precaution is distinctive within science-based risk management and is characterized by three basic tenets: the need for a decision, a risk of serious or irreversible harm and a lack of full scientific certainty.145"

And: ""Since the Framework provides a series of principles a decision-maker must follow to protect the environment, it is not surprising that the Framework makes it expressly clear that any impact on the assessment of trade occurs only after the decision- maker has determined the level of protection is consistent with society’s values. Accordingly, the Framework’s last principle makes it clear that the impact on trade is to be considered only after the decision to apply precautionary measures has been made"

And: In closing, Allard puts it this way: "The precautionary principle does more than forbid decision makers from using scientific uncertainty as an excuse for regulatory inaction. It requires decision makers to err on the side of caution by anticipating harm and taking protective measures when there is environmental risk even if there is scientific uncertainty."

And that the minister must do what is reasonable, not what he thinks is reasonable, but what the situation requires as the most reasonable outcome, such as putting fish farms on land."

And, thus industry claims of wasted investment are not valid.

Finally, you may know that my list of on-land fish farm systems now sits at 281 such RAS systems: https://fishfarmnews.blogspot.com/2016/05/152-different-on-land-fish-farm-systems.html. 

Yes, that is nearly 300 on-land fish farm systems. This is a no-brainer, even for a fish farm, because they can continue to operate in BC with their present employees, only now on land.

If only DFO were sufficiently illuminated. "DFO build an on-land fish farm in Ottawa, just don't use BC/Iceland stocks of eggs/fry because you'll get PRV/HSMI."

Come on, that's funny.

Remember, it's only four months to the election: Vote No to Liberals. "You voted no to wild salmon by voting no to PRV testing, so we are voting no to you." 

***

Hold on a sec while I lift myself up from the floor after I fell out of my chair. DFO says it will test for PRV:  https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/testing-bc-fish-farms-prv-virus-1.5163032?utm_source=Watershed+Watch+Email+List&utm_campaign=73bdaa2444-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_06_05_10_07&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_405944b1b5-73bdaa2444-166907249&mc_cid=73bdaa2444&mc_eid=5777c92bcd.

The only thing is that its 'report' that showed PRV doesn't affect Fraser sockeye was panned by experts on the committee because DFO would not give them the research to look at before it, on their behalf, said the experts agreed PRV doesn't affect Fraser sockeye.

Hmm. Read Stan Proboszcz' rebuttal to DFO on this one: https://fishfarmnews.blogspot.com/2018/02/new-science-copmmittee-dont-bother.html. This one has Stan's take on the 'non science' from DFO on sockeye, two links, actually.

And on science in general at DFO:  https://policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/april-2018/integrity-of-the-dfos-science-advisory-process-in-question/.

And Brian Riddell's response to the Rapid Science Response: https://fishfarmnews.blogspot.com/2018/11/fake-science-by-dfo-riddell-response.html.

Well, I'll fall off my chair again, if DFO finds no problem from PRV when DFO has already found a problem with PRV.

                                                   *********
And... I fell off my chair, yet again, with the news, just in, Feb 11, 2020:  
 
Here in BC, DFO has refused scientific evidence on harm and killing of wild salmon by PRV four times now:  https://alexandramorton.typepad.com/alexandra_morton/2020/01/the-virus-prv-brings-out-the-worst-in-dfo.html?fbclid=IwAR1RVl5HttXekuttvJChNOwu51SufY3oxLT3uc7hZ_TScKjBL5nyr0siMuE.

DFO Taken to Court for Not Protecting Wild BC Salmon from PRVirus Farmed Salmon, Updated Jan 7, 2017

DFO is not protecting wild BC salmon, and Ecojustice is taking them to court. You will recall that this legal defense team took DFO to court for wanting to allows PRV infected farmed salmon in BC waters (yes, I know this seems very odd for DFO to defend putting salmon with disease viruses in the water). 

But Ecojustice acting on behalf of wild salmon and Alex Morton is going after DFO to keep those disease virus fish out of the water.

Here is their take:

"The Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) and aquaculture giant Marine Harvest have finally dropped their appeal of our precedent-setting Federal Court victory, which held that the government cannot offload its regulatory duties to that same aquaculture companies it is supposed to regulate.

This development is a welcome piece of good news.  We have been working with our client, biologist Alexandra Morton, to secure this legal victory for B.C.’s wild salmon since 2013. [Yes, DFO, in Ottawa, has been trying to force farmed fish with diseases and the virus PRV into BC ocean for the past three years].

That said, our work to protect B.C.’s wild salmon is far from done.

In April, just days before the hearing for DFO and Marine Harvest’s appeal was abruptly adjourned, DFO scientists revealed that heart and skeletal muscle inflammation (HSMI) had been found on B.C. salmon farms.  This disease can be deadly to wild salmon — heart damage makes it difficult for them to capture prey, escape predators, and spawn.

[Yes, HSMI is the disease that PRV is thought to cause - yes, it is a semantic issue that having the virus is not the same thing as having the disease, until the virus is isolated from a sick fish, cultured and sequenced. Note that I have a link to a research article from Norway in 2011 that confirms PRV causes HSMI. DFO seems not to be able to find it, but you can find it in this report PDF: https://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=17&ved=0ahUKEwinqtiqv4_QAhVRxWMKHV77ARI4ChAWCEEwBg&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.vetinst.no%2Frapporter-og-publikasjoner%2Frapporter%2F2016%2Ffish-health-report-2015%2F_%2Fattachment%2Fdownload%2Fd59c0da2-22fb-4881-8d29-be75553f16be%3A72a2ab576ec65bce833798aeeeff3598beb56fa3%2F3b%2520-%2520Fish%2520Health%2520Report%25202015-web.pdf&usg=AFQjCNHYGpIJ3Dkxvk7pWFdT3GKcNtQyBQ&sig2=dFcfR0BKd_9R2KswVgM3Og .]

We’ve since learned that DFO refuses to test farmed salmon for piscine reovirus, believed by many scientists to be the causative agent of HSMI, before allowing those fish to be transferred into open-net ocean pens alongside wild salmon.  As a result, we have launched a new lawsuit against DFO to compel it to protect wild salmon.

[Yes, it is peculiar for DFO to be sued for refusing to protect wild BC salmon from fish farm salmon, but you may want to see my file on Bad News Bites on the global news diseases/disasters/bankruptcies/boom-bust cycles/conflicts in the fish farm industry: http://fishfarmnews.blogspot.ca/2016/07/news-bites-farmed-salmonseafood.html.]

It’s become very clear that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans won’t stand up for wild salmon.  But, thanks to your support, we will.

Margot at Ecojustice: http://www.ecojustice.ca/breaking-news-early-christmas-present-wild-salmon/?utm_source=Watershed+Watch+Email+List&utm_campaign=e0d8c79f0c-Salmon_News_Jan4_2017&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_405944b1b5-e0d8c79f0c-166907249&mc_cid=e0d8c79f0c&mc_eid=5777c92bcd.

Thank you Margot and Ecojustice, and Alex Morton, too.

Here is another backgrounder on this case, from Ecojustice: http://www.ecojustice.ca/case/government-oversight-of-fish-farms/.
 

Christmas has come early for B.C.’s wild salmon.
The Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) and aquaculture giant Marine Harvest have finally dropped their appeal of our precedent-setting Federal Court victory, which held that the government cannot offload its regulatory duties to that same aquaculture companies it is supposed to regulate.
This development is a welcome piece of good news.  We have been working with our client, biologist Alexandra Morton, to secure this legal victory for B.C.’s wild salmon since 2013.
That said, our work to protect B.C.’s wild salmon is far from done.
In April, just days before the hearing for DFO and Marine Harvest’s appeal was abruptly adjourned, DFO scientists revealed that heart and skeletal muscle inflammation (HSMI) had been found on B.C. salmon farms.  This disease can be deadly to wild salmon — heart damage makes it difficult for them to capture prey, escape predators, and spawn.
We’ve since learned that DFO refuses to test farmed salmon for piscine reovirus, believed by many scientists to be the causative agent of HSMI, before allowing those fish to be transferred into open-net ocean pens alongside wild salmon.  As a result, we have launched a new lawsuit against DFO to compel it to protect wild salmon.
It’s become very clear that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans won’t stand up for wild salmon.  But, thanks to your support, we will.
Happy holidays to you and your loved ones,
Margot
- See more at: http://www.ecojustice.ca/breaking-news-early-christmas-present-wild-salmon/?utm_source=Watershed+Watch+Email+List&utm_campaign=e0d8c79f0c-Salmon_News_Jan4_2017&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_405944b1b5-e0d8c79f0c-166907249&mc_cid=e0d8c79f0c&mc_eid=5777c92bcd#sthash.62ewQaqj.dpuf

Christmas has come early for B.C.’s wild salmon.
The Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) and aquaculture giant Marine Harvest have finally dropped their appeal of our precedent-setting Federal Court victory, which held that the government cannot offload its regulatory duties to that same aquaculture companies it is supposed to regulate.
This development is a welcome piece of good news.  We have been working with our client, biologist Alexandra Morton, to secure this legal victory for B.C.’s wild salmon since 2013.
That said, our work to protect B.C.’s wild salmon is far from done.
In April, just days before the hearing for DFO and Marine Harvest’s appeal was abruptly adjourned, DFO scientists revealed that heart and skeletal muscle inflammation (HSMI) had been found on B.C. salmon farms.  This disease can be deadly to wild salmon — heart damage makes it difficult for them to capture prey, escape predators, and spawn.
We’ve since learned that DFO refuses to test farmed salmon for piscine reovirus, believed by many scientists to be the causative agent of HSMI, before allowing those fish to be transferred into open-net ocean pens alongside wild salmon.  As a result, we have launched a new lawsuit against DFO to compel it to protect wild salmon.
It’s become very clear that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans won’t stand up for wild salmon.  But, thanks to your support, we will.
Happy holidays to you and your loved ones,
Margot
- See more at: http://www.ecojustice.ca/breaking-news-early-christmas-present-wild-salmon/?utm_source=Watershed+Watch+Email+List&utm_campaign=e0d8c79f0c-Salmon_News_Jan4_2017&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_405944b1b5-e0d8c79f0c-166907249&mc_cid=e0d8c79f0c&mc_eid=5777c92bcd#sthash.62ewQaqj.dpuf

Christmas has come early for B.C.’s wild salmon.
The Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) and aquaculture giant Marine Harvest have finally dropped their appeal of our precedent-setting Federal Court victory, which held that the government cannot offload its regulatory duties to that same aquaculture companies it is supposed to regulate.
This development is a welcome piece of good news.  We have been working with our client, biologist Alexandra Morton, to secure this legal victory for B.C.’s wild salmon since 2013.
That said, our work to protect B.C.’s wild salmon is far from done.
In April, just days before the hearing for DFO and Marine Harvest’s appeal was abruptly adjourned, DFO scientists revealed that heart and skeletal muscle inflammation (HSMI) had been found on B.C. salmon farms.  This disease can be deadly to wild salmon — heart damage makes it difficult for them to capture prey, escape predators, and spawn.
We’ve since learned that DFO refuses to test farmed salmon for piscine reovirus, believed by many scientists to be the causative agent of HSMI, before allowing those fish to be transferred into open-net ocean pens alongside wild salmon.  As a result, we have launched a new lawsuit against DFO to compel it to protect wild salmon.
It’s become very clear that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans won’t stand up for wild salmon.  But, thanks to your support, we will.
Happy holidays to you and your loved ones,
Margot
- See more at: http://www.ecojustice.ca/breaking-news-early-christmas-present-wild-salmon/?utm_source=Watershed+Watch+Email+List&utm_campaign=e0d8c79f0c-Salmon_News_Jan4_2017&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_405944b1b5-e0d8c79f0c-166907249&mc_cid=e0d8c79f0c&mc_eid=5777c92bcd#sthash.62ewQaqj.dpuf

Christmas has come early for B.C.’s wild salmon.
The Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) and aquaculture giant Marine Harvest have finally dropped their appeal of our precedent-setting Federal Court victory, which held that the government cannot offload its regulatory duties to that same aquaculture companies it is supposed to regulate.
This development is a welcome piece of good news.  We have been working with our client, biologist Alexandra Morton, to secure this legal victory for B.C.’s wild salmon since 2013.
That said, our work to protect B.C.’s wild salmon is far from done.
In April, just days before the hearing for DFO and Marine Harvest’s appeal was abruptly adjourned, DFO scientists revealed that heart and skeletal muscle inflammation (HSMI) had been found on B.C. salmon farms.  This disease can be deadly to wild salmon — heart damage makes it difficult for them to capture prey, escape predators, and spawn.
We’ve since learned that DFO refuses to test farmed salmon for piscine reovirus, believed by many scientists to be the causative agent of HSMI, before allowing those fish to be transferred into open-net ocean pens alongside wild salmon.  As a result, we have launched a new lawsuit against DFO to compel it to protect wild salmon.
It’s become very clear that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans won’t stand up for wild salmon.  But, thanks to your support, we will.
Happy holidays to you and your loved ones,
Margot
- See more at: http://www.ecojustice.ca/breaking-news-early-christmas-present-wild-salmon/?utm_source=Watershed+Watch+Email+List&utm_campaign=e0d8c79f0c-Salmon_News_Jan4_2017&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_405944b1b5-e0d8c79f0c-166907249&mc_cid=e0d8c79f0c&mc_eid=5777c92bcd#sthash.62ewQaqj.dpuf

Marine Harvest Diseases, Wild Herring Eaten, HSMI, PRV - BC 2016, Updated Sept 22, 2016

 All disease issues in farmed salmon are solved, for wild salmon, and farmed ones, if farms are put on land in closed containment systems with recirculated water, and filtration of waste. On land systems have no diseases save the ones the stocked smolts may have, and sensibly raising such fish, eliminates such diseases.

These images are taken from the five minute Gopro video that Alex Morton took at the Midsummer, Marine Harvest farm in the Broughton Archipelago, in August 2016. This was a randomly chosen farm in a randomly chosen pen. Because the odds of this showing disease and the other issues, a reasonable person would conclude that many pens on many farms also show disease.

See the video here: https://www.facebook.com/alexandra.morton.1671/posts/1872308546331031?notif_t=close_friend_activity&notif_id=1473526423741130.  It has been viewed 750,000 times as of Sept 10,2016. This is huge interest in the well being of BC wild salmon.

The one below shows an emaciated, farmed Atlantic Salmon exhibiting the visual symptoms of HSMI/PRV. Would you eat this fish? Do you want this obviously diseased fish in BC water? I don't think so.

Meanwhile, Marine Harvest, Cermaq and Grieg Seafood cling to a semantic twist, and claim there is no PRV in BC (because a viral isolate has yet to be grown), that PRV does not cause HSMI (again for the same semantic twist) and that if HSMI were here it is caught from wild salmon, not PRV imported from Norway. Any reasonable person who looks at this two-inch-thick salmon, concludes it is an obviously sick fish. 

The second image shows a farmed fish eating wild herring inside the net. This is against the law. Do you want this to happen in BC? I don't think so. Note that the herring spawn has been eliminated in Kingcome Inlet for decades and there are 30 farms in this Musgamagw FN territory. Hmm.

The third image shows the pen's Atlantic farmed salmon exhibiting a common behaviour of farmed salmon with HSMI - they line up at the net, and sit there as they are too sick to move. HSMI stands for heart and skeletal muscle inflammation. It is easy to see why.

 

The fourth image shows wild herring outside the net eating fish farm feed that flows through the net, something that includes astaxanthin colouring, and the various PCBs, fire retardants and POPs found in fish farm feed. Do you want wild fish eating these chemicals? I think not.

Please go sign Fin Donnelly's Petition e-463 to get fish farms out of the water and set up on land. If they don't want to, they can go back to Norway and set up on land there, as Norway is also fed up with their environmental damage and is offering zero-cost licences for so doing, a $9- to $12-million subsidy, based on the saltwater auction price for a licence.

Sign at: https://petitions.parl.gc.ca/en/Petition/Details?Petition=e-463.

People who have to live with in-ocean fish farms come to overwhelmingly reject them and this is from countries around the world, as far away as Tasmania, and close by as Alaska, Atlantic Canada, Scotland and etc..........

DFO and CFIA Testing of Diseases in Farmed Salmon

Here is a letter I received today about DFO not testing farmed salmon for PRV (Piscene Rheovirus aka HSMI, the Norwegian heart and skeletal muscle inflammation).

1. The point is that DFO and the CFIA are in conflict with the fish farm industry. The Cohen Commission told the federal government to end the conflict for DFO and take from it supporting farmed salmon, and get on with its duty to protect wild Pacific salmon.

2. The CFIA were shown to be only interested in the export dollars from farmed salmon, not wild Pacific salmon.

3. When the CFIA tested for ISA in Pacific salmon, they were shown to be testing for the Atlantic Canada variant of ISA. They found no ISA which is not surprising because it is the Norwegian variant of ISA that has been transported to BC. You will note AM's point that the samples kept were kept in RNA and thus are of no value.
4. DFO should not be appealing the decision that said all farmed smolts to be transferred needed to be tested. That is standing against wild Pacific Salmon.
5. I would be surprised if PRV was endemic as it is the virus associated with HSMI in Norway.
6. The CEO of Marine Harvest recently stated that they have 90 scientific studies going to find a solution to lice, which he said was the biggest problem in Norway. Sea lice are a problem wherever farmed salmon are allowed.






Alex Morton aksing DFO about PRV testing:

Dear Diane Trager

In a meeting earlier this year with you and representatives of Wild Salmon Forever, I asked you the question -  is DFO testing farmed salmon smolts prior to transfer into marine net pens on our wild salmon migration routes? You said you would find out, but I have not heard back from you.

As you know I won a legal decision this year that requires DFO to make the decision, at every transfer, whether PRV-infected Atlantic salmon smolts can be transferred into BC marine waters.

Somewhat shockingly DFO has joined with Marine Harvest to appeal this decision, so the salmon farmers can make this decision without DFO. It is hard to see how that serves the citizens of Canada,  however, I want to know is DFO testing salmon farming hatcheries today, prior to smolt transfer.  If not, defacto, the industry is making this decision, if they are even testing for PRV at all.

This is a significant issue as I know from my own work that nearly all Atlantic salmon for sale in BC markets are infected with PRV.  While DFO appears to depend on Dr. Gary Marty’s opinion that PRV is benign and endemic, his views were resoundingly debunked by scientists from across Canada.  

“To make that argument, Dr. Marty… has used the literature very selectively and improperly and in some cases he has misquoted or miscited information. These are cardinal sins in academia. His entire approach is very biased and presupposes the conclusion before he presents the evidence for it”  (Dr. Larry Dill, Vancouver Sun, June 12, 2015, 1st version)

This is extremely strong language and so DFO, at some level, must realize that there might be problems with Dr. Marty’s conclusions.

DFO’s preference for farmed salmon over wild salmon is shameful.  The failures are stacking up like sockeye dying in the Fraser River.  The CFIA testing for ISA virus is a sham as they stored the samples in RNALater, which prevents confirmation of the virus in Canada.  You have ignored the Cohen Commission, given the farms longterm leases, permission to use chemicals that kill fish, and DFO has done nothing to reprimand the companies involved in the shameful sea louse outbreak in the Broughton this spring that heavily infected over 90% of the juvenile out-migrating salmon.  The wild fish are a valuable public resource and yet they are treated as vermin.

DFO is allowing the industry to expand when Norway is reining them in due to their lack of ability to control sea lice, even with a wide suit of available drugs. DFO is no longer doing enumeration of wild salmon and there is no indication of response to the extreme conditions wild salmon are facing this summer in the rivers.  DFO now has a reputation of destroying scientific libraries and muzzling scientists.  

I can only conclude that DFO’s longterm plan is to closure of salmon fisheries and to let wild salmon slip into extinction, similar to how DFO presided over the demise of Canada’s cod fishery, muzzling DFO scientist, Dr. Ransom Myers who tried to inform DFO of how to protect that incredible valuable resource, one of the biggest wild food resources on earth.  But he too was muzzled, the cod collapsed and very quickly thereafter the Hibernia oil wells were affixed on the Grand Banks.  I think context is important here.

Are you allowed by your masters to answer this simple question?

Is DFO testing all farmed salmon for PRV and other pathogens prior to transfer into our marine environment.

For those of us determined to bequeath wild salmon to the next generation, we need to know.

Thank you,

Alexandra Morton

PRV Found in BC, Judge Tells DFO, Fish Farms They Can't Put Diseased Fish in the Sea

Here is the kind of uncritical news on the internet that fails to groundproof what fish farms say.

Judge Rennie ruled that BC fish farms couldn't put diseased fish in the pristine BC ocean. It told DFO it had four months to put regs in place.

But on Seafood News, their version is:

http://www.seafoodnews.com/Story/974908/75113/Anti-Salmon-Farm-Activists-Win-Court-Victory-in-BC-as-Court-Buys-Disputed-Claim-About-Transfers.

Anti-Salmon Farm Activists Win Court Victory in BC, as Court Buys Disputed Claim About Transfers

SEAFOODNEWS.COM [The Canadian Press] May 8, 2015 

[This court ruling was a victory for anti-salmon farming activists in BC.  However it is unclear about the practical effect, because the virus in question is naturally occuring in BC waters and existed long before salmon farms were introduced.  The actual charge of illegally moving 'sick' fish, was due to the presence of this naturally occuring virus which is not identified as a disease by salmon farmers. JS]

The problem is that PRV is a Norwegian Atlantic disease and the claim it is in BC naturally is bull. Norwegian PRV causes HSMI and is one of the recent, big killers of farmed salmon. Miller's work in the Cohen Commission showed that as high as 90% of wild Fraser sockeye were infected with this disease, after passing fish farms.

And fish farms not identifying it as a disease matters little, as it is DFO's responsibility and the OIE to make this determination. Also fish farms trade on the semantic issue that, as they claim, a fish can have the virus but not the disease. They are the only people in the world who construe the disease this way. It is a killer in Norway and BC wild salmon have been shown to have it, too.

Critique: Mary Ellen Walling Letter to Victoria Times - Kibenge

This post contains three items: DC Reid article in the Times Colonist Newspaper, Mary Ellen Walling letter to the Times Colonist Newspaper, and my critique of Mary Ellen Walling's letter.

This is the DC Reid article:

Wild BC Salmon Lose Disease Doctor

A very important negative event occurred recently with the World Animal Health Organization (OIE) pulling Dr. Fred Kibenge’s status as the only disease reference lab in the western hemisphere for testing fish diseases, particularly, ISA from farmed Atlantic salmon.

I asked the OIE several times for the origin of the complaint but received no response. While news releases have pointed to complaints from other countries, the other factor is that the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), discredited in the Cohen Commission testimony in December 2011, has made representations to the OIE to pull Kibenge’s status. In testimony they were cornered into admitting their interests are the export possibilities of the largely Norwegian-owned farms over natural wild salmon, a clear conflict of interest. Dr. Kim Klottins said the CFIA didn’t want to find ISA in BC. The video is not pretty.

You will have recently read in the TC that they tested several thousand wild salmon – not farmed fish, the source of the Atlantic Ocean diseases, ISA and HSMI – and announced they found no ISA in BC. That should be a good thing because the two diseases could well lead to the demise of all eleven Pacific salmonid species from California all the way to Korea. But it is not a good thing.

Drs. Miller (DFO, Nanaimo), Kibenge (PEI) and Nylund (the only other OIE lab in the world, in Norway), have found ISA in BC wild salmon. During Cohen they discredited the DFO, CFIA and the BC testing systems. The CFIA and DFO use the Moncton lab under Dr. Gagne, and the experts found its procedures don’t find ISA and its equipment is poor; this means a negative response for the worst fish farm disease means nothing. These doctors have found literally tens of thousands of cases of ISA in BC, dating all the way back to 1988.

For instance, Miller’s work showed 25% of Clayoquot Sound farmed Chinook had ISA and HSMI. This means 125,000 to 250,000 fish per farm. There are 22 farms in the Sound and wild Chinook numbers are at extinction levels – only 501 fish in six rivers. The Kennedy Lake sockeye run, once the largest on Van Isle, is no more.

The CFIA is a member on the OIE council which has members from many nations. Kibenge was the lab that found Atlantic ISA, (Nylund showed it was taken from Norway), in Chile. In 2008, ISA wiped out quarter of a billion farmed salmon, a loss of $2 Billion, with 13,000 losing jobs. The CFIA with its $740 million budget apparently wants to control the narrative with respect to farmed salmon diseases in Canada, and so Kibenge lost his status as the place where wild BC salmon have been sent most frequently for testing by concerned BC residents.

I read a scientific study not long ago that says fish farms cause a loss of 50% of the wild salmon/trout where they are introduced, and this includes BC. There are, for instance, only 6,000 wild Chinook spawners on the entire west coast of Vancouver Island. You will recall the Georgia St. coho fishery tanked in the 1980s. Then there are the Owikeno sockeye in the 1990s, etc. Fewer wild salmon translates into fewer jobs in BC Stats data, for example, commercial employment is down 50%. The largest sector, sport fishing, could likely employ more people, too. 

This is the Walling letter:

Re: “Loss of wild-salmon disease doctor will have major impact,” July 16.

(1)In the column, the actions of the World Animal Health Organization in pulling the infectious-salmon-anemia reference status at Dr. Fred Kibenge’s lab are presented as a negative. In fact, the organization’s decision should be viewed as a positive one. The organization conducted an audit with an international panel of scientific experts and found a series of weaknesses affecting the quality of diagnoses performed at the lab — which led to the unanimous decision by the general assembly of the organization to delist the lab.

(2). This news should reassure the public, as it shows that labs carrying international designations are held to high standards.

(3)It is correct that several thousand wild salmon were tested and no ISA was found. Thousands of Atlantic salmon have also been tested for ISA and those tests were also negative.

(4) ISA is a concern for B.C. salmon farmers — it has the potential to have an impact on our industry. That’s why our fish are tested and why we support ongoing wild- and farmed-fish monitoring programs.

(5). All the world’s oceans are connected, so it makes sense that viruses that have been found in other areas might eventually be found in B.C. That’s why ongoing monitoring of both wild and farm-raised fish is important so if a virus that causes disease, as not all do, does appear, it is found quickly and can be dealt with
.
Mary Ellen Walling
Executive Director, B.C. Salmon Farmers Association
Campbell River

Here is my Critique:

(1). The only evidence of complaint is the CFIA letter to the OIE. The CFIA told me only one other country complained.  And, of course, the CFIA, DFO and BC testing systems were shown to be deficient. 

(2). The Kibenge lab is the one that determined the Chile ISA infection and Nylund showed the ISA came from Norway. The subject only became public after Aqua Gen who transported eggs to Chile sued Nylund for bad science. They lost.

The big Norwegian companies have taken ISA to virtually every country they have gone to set up shop. The usual scenario is refusing to accept that ISA has been taken, with, once it is found, saying, well we just have to live with this. The problem in BC is the world's greatest salmon resource, the entire Pacific Ocean  is under threat of extinction, something that has never happened before.

Tragically, ISA is now in NS, NB and NL, as well as in BC - Miller, Kibenge and Nylund have found hundreds of thousands of cases of ISA in BC

(3). The DFO, CFIA and BC testing systems were all discredited by Miller, Kibenge and Nylund during the Cohen Commission.

(4). All the testing systems have been discredited. The BC public are right to be concerned with all wild salmon being killed by farmed diseases. Salmon farms can be eliminated from the ocean in two months by pulling their leases.

Also, the public is pretty appalled when I tell them that fish farms get reimbursed with taxpayer dollars - up to $30 per fish - by the CF|IA

(5). This is a classic fantasy generated by fish farms. Marine Harvest, Cermaq Minstream and Grieg Seafood, all Norwegian origin firms, are well aware that ISA, HSMI and other diseases are carried by imports of eggs and fry, both horizontal and vertical transmission of disease - not carried by the ocean tens of thousands of miles. That's just silly. 

Fish farms sure complain when environmentalists come anywhere close to their sites under quarantine, even though they are hemmorrheging 65 Billion viral particles per hour into wild BC salmon waters. 

Go read the Spinwatch.org article on how they neutralized a Science 2004 study that showed cancer causing chemicals and other persistent organic pollutants were in Scottish, and other country, farmed fish. It reads like a Hollywood thriller conspiracy blockbuster - link in several articles on this site. You will not believe any claim by a fish farm company ever again.

See Spinwatch link:: http://www.spinwatch.org/index.php/issues/health/item/141-spinning-farmed-salmon-part-3-of-3