And agent, you don't know if it wasn't always present in BC. The reason, as I understand it, that PRV was "discovered" recently wasn't because it is a "new" virus intro'd by the fish farm operations. It's because technology has advanced to the point that allowed it to be "discovered". So it is therefore impossible to make the claim that PRV didn't exist in Pacific salmon before it was "discovered", and fish farms brought it in..
Well, were to begin with those comments, hmmm...
Either fish health monitoring is “adequate” as industry pundits like Clayoquot Kid claims, or it is not. I am strongly of the opinion that fish health monitoring is and has been inadequate for over 30 years now. You cannot shut the barn doors after the viral horses have left and are now leaving their colts to roam over previously unoccupied fields. As I listed on
http://www.sportfishingbc.com/forum...fish-farm-rejected-risk-to-wild-salmon/page32, the unresolved issues in fish health monitoring for farmed/wild stock interactions are as follows:
1/ Farm data is not publicly available,
2/ Farm data is not publicly-available on a site-specific basis,
3/ Farm data on fish health goes through the filter of the provincial fish vet who gets to decide whether or not to test for certain diseases. There is no third party monitoring or public oversight,
4/ The office of the provincial fish vet protects the farms by withholding farm-specific fish health data from the public,
5/ The fish farms, their association and their lawyers have been successful in obstructing inspectors and in the release of fish health records,
6/ There is a unnecessary and irresponsible time delay between noticing, reporting and investigation of symptoms and between initiation of control procedures of days to weeks while transfer of disease vectors continues between cultured and wild stocks. Response time is critical when dealing with highly migratory stocks,
7/ The testing for “confirmation” of disease vectors like ISA as dictated by CFIA testing protocols (i.e. The PCR method) requires a testing protocol that can only test for known strains of known diseases. This testing protocol is ineffective in recognizing introduced and emerging diseases like ISA,
8/ There is no public notification system for outbreaks,
9/ Adjacent wild stocks are not concurrently tested in association with a disease outbreak,
10/ Wild stocks have not been adequately tested as part of an ongoing monitoring program,
11/ There is no way for public input to be systematically utilized in the development of disease response plans and CFIA wants the public to know as little as possible about diseases on fish farms,
12/ There is no scientifically-defensible disease response plans because proper siting criteria has NOT been utilized in the aquaculture tenure applications,
13/ We do not know enough about infection dynamics, epidemiology, persistence and life cycles of both known and emerging diseases in order to complete proper risk assessments and to initiate risk reduction measures for protection of wild stocks,
14/ Risk assessments for each disease have not been performed,
15/ Risk assessments for each farm site have not been performed,
16/ Other fish health response procedures not yet identified, consulted and completed include: Environmental Impact Policy, cost-benefit analysis of alternative control/eradication strategies, predictive modeling, retrospective analysis, contingency planning, risk of disease transmissions, establishing incident plans, monitoring effectiveness of control measures, resource planning, and incident response training,
17/ Other fish health responses not identified to the public include: procedure for notifying and consulting First Nations and the public about a disease affecting cultured stocks after a veterinary inspector has been notified, follow-up actions such as biocontainment and movement controls, quarantine orders, setting the limits of the disease Control Area, and disposal and disinfection activities.
Almost all of the above points relate to the HMSI/PRV issue, but especially points 1-5 and 9-10.
There has been inadequate testing before and during the expansion of the open net-cage industry, and we are only beginning to understand the aetiology, infection dynamics, host physiological consequences, and potential population-level effects of many disease-causing organisms such as PRV, ISA and many others.
To state that Norwegian-strain ISA, PRV or any other exotic European disease existed in BC BEFORE the fish farms arrived is bizarre, inane, misleading, scientifically invalid AND not-to-mention downright stupid and condescending.
Because the fish farm industry had inadequate controls and oversight – NO we cannot “prove” it was introduced by fish farms in a legal sense, BUT using “common sense” - there is no other viable explanation as to how a Norwegian strain virus became endemic in a Pacific population of wild salmonids.
The only flying fish capable of flying across the landmass of North America are aboard a commercial airline carrying inadequately tested eggs for the open net-pen industry.
the PRV doesn't seem to have en effect on salmon farmed or wild. Fish with HSM I also had PRV. However fish could havce PRV without HSMI.
Yes, for the fish that survive the initial infection - fish can have PRV in a dormant state and not exhibit symptoms or develop the later stages of the disease unless they get stressed: stresses like osmoregulatory (returning to freshwater from the ocean or vice-versa); stresses like swimming past velocity barriers when returning upstream; or stresses like spawning. Good thing none of these stresses affect our wild salmon, eh?
To suggest that PRV is “benign” is similarly inane, misleading, scientifically invalid AND not-to-mention downright stupid and condescending.
Check-out : Ferguson, H.W., Kongtorp, R.T., Taksdal, T., Graham, D., Falk, K. 2005 An outbreak of disease resembling heart and skeletal muscle inflammation in Scottish farmed salmon, Salmo salar L., with observation on myocardial regeneration. Journal of Fish Disease 28, 119-123.
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15705157
In this article the researchers compare HMSI, SPD (salmon pancreas disease) and CMS (cardiomyopathy syndrome) and they make this observation: “cardiac lesions are more severe” when referring to HMSI. In addition, they report “pale lethargic fish accumulating on the net floor, sometimes lying on their sides,” and “soft, flabby” hearts. “There is little doubt that fish with lesions as severe as these would be reluctant to move and would be suffering clinically from a failing cardiovascular system.”
Do you think most wild salmon who have HMSI would survive the trip upstream? What about the massive pre-spawn die-offs we have seen? Were the fish tested for PRV? Can you scientifically defend your assumption that PRV is truly a “benign” disease for wild stocks, and causes no population-level morbidity or mortality?
Also check-out:
http://www.ecojustice.ca/files/prv-hsmi-summary-of-facts-may-2013/
