Salmon virus is not the problem that some claim
By Mary Ellen Walling, The Daily News November 23, 2011
Re: 'Ottawa failing to act as required on ISA problem' (Your Letters, Nov. 22)
It's unfortunate that Ruby Berry at the Georgia Strait Alliance hasn't updated her information on the work that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency are doing to follow up on two inconclusive tests for ISA in British Columbia widely publicized by Simon Fraser University.
Contrary to what she says, significant follow-up testing has taken place showing that these samples were in fact, negative for ISA. Further testing was done on other samples as well, all proving negative. Some samples collected as part of the follow up investigation were too degraded to be tested - but many were not, and the testing has shown that those initial results were in fact, false.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency, along with the DFO is now, as a result, also reviewing sampling programs to ensure that their monitoring is robust and accurate.
Our farmers are continuing their sampling program as well - a program that has tested nearly 5,000 fish, and found no ISA in British Columbia salmon farms.
Mary Ellen Walling Executive Director B.C. Salmon Farmers Association
BCSFA responded to the following:
Ottawa failing to act as required on ISA problem
Ruby Berry, The Daily News, Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Recent reports of the presence of the deadly ISA virus in B.C. wild salmon seem to have alarmed everyone except those meant to be taking care of the wild salmon.
Rather than taking immediate measures to determine the extent of this threat, Fisheries and Oceans Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency leapt to discredit the findings and assure international markets that all is well in Canadian waters. Unfortunately, their claim rests on inconclusive evidence and degraded samples.
Instead of launching an emergency investigation into this potential disaster, the federal government has announced a $1-million grant to the Canadian Aquaculture Industry Alliance for international advertising. It appears that the health of B.C. waters, and the wild salmon is not the priority of the federal government after all.
Ruby Berry Georgia Strait Alliance Nanaimo
