No chill, just lousy science
There has been a flurry of media attention to the removal by the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) of the Atlantic Veterinary College’s (AVC) laboratory section as an ISAV reference facility which has been operated by Dr. Fred Kibenge since he claimed to have found evidence of ISAV in samples of wild salmon from British Columbia supplied by anti-salmon farming activist Alexandra Morton and professor Rick Routledge from the Simon Fraser University, which issued Ms. Morton an honourary doctorate a couple of years ago. No other laboratory has come up with the same conclusions, and a complaint was forwarded to the OIE about the performance of the Kibenge lab. One media report about this issue was provided by Alison Auld of the Canadian Press last week, where she suggests that “Reporting virus could be put on hold; experts afraid that deadly fish disease won't be disclosed due to backlash”;
Scientists fear there could be a reluctance to report a deadly fish virus after the first lab in Canada to say it had been detected in British Columbia salmon was stripped of a special reference status by an international agency. Marine researchers say they were stunned to hear that the World Organization for Animal Health, or OIE, recently suspended the reference status for a research laboratory at the Atlantic Veterinary College in Prince Edward Island. Run by Fred Kibenge, who is considered one of the world's leading authorities on infectious salmon anemia, it was one of only two labs in the world recognized by the group for the testing of the virus. Kibenge's work came under scrutiny in 2011 after he said he had found evidence of the virulent disease in wild B.C. sockeye salmon, challenging the Canadian Food Inspection Agency's position that the virus is not present in the province.
His findings led the inspection agency to conduct an audit and send their findings to the OIE, which did its own audit and announced last month that it was delisting Kibenge's lab in a move that some say could discourage reporting of infectious salmon anemia."This is creating a very chilly environment for people to investigate the presence of this virus in the Pacific Ocean," said Rick Routledge, a professor at Simon Fraser University who gave Kibenge the salmon samples that tested positive.
Routledge, who has studied juvenile sockeye salmon migrations for 10 years in B.C., said he wanted to understand why the population was declining and used Kibenge's lab to examine possible causes.The findings caused the Cohen Commission, a federal inquiry looking into the decline of sockeye salmon in B.C., to extend its hearings so Kibenge and others could testify about the possible presence of the virus.
A couple of days later, Mr. Larry Fletcher from White Rock, B.C. provided the following comment to The Province newspaper, suggesting there is “no chill, just lousy science”;
No, Rick Routledge of Simon Fraser University, the World Organization for Animal Health’s decision to remove the special reference status from the Atlantic Veterinary College does not create a “very chilly environment for people to investigate the presence of this virus in the Pacific Ocean.”
An internationally recognized agency’s audit found that there was none in your samples. That’s just science. If you want out of the chill, actually find some trace of virus.
Following accusations by environmentalists that the de-listing of the AVC as an ISAV reference facilty was done by the Canadian government, the agency responsible for fish health- the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) issued the following statement;
In Canada, infectious salmon anemia is a federally reportable disease. This means that all suspected cases must be immediately reported to the CFIA for follow-up investigation and testing. In late 2011, the former OIE reference laboratory at the AVC reportedly found evidence of ISA. Because any suspected cases of ISA must be confirmed at a designated federal laboratory, the National Aquatic Animal Health Laboratory, overseen by Fisheries and Oceans Canada, conducted testing of fish samples. The positive test results reported by the AVC were not corroborated by the DFO laboratory.
Due to the differences observed in these test results, the CFIA conducted evaluations of both laboratories to assess their capability to reliably detect the ISA virus in accordance with accepted scientific standards. The evaluation conducted at the AVC identified concerns, which may have led to the questionable ISA test results. This information was shared with the OIE.
The OIE designates reference laboratory status based on a laboratory’s ability to maintain the highest technical and operational standards. The OIE undertook an independent audit of the AVC after another OIE member country also reported issues related to ISA test results from this laboratory. The OIE audit, performed by an international panel of scientific experts, found a series of weaknesses affecting the quality of diagnoses performed at the AVC laboratory. The decision to delist this laboratory as an OIE reference laboratory was approved unanimously by the World Assembly of Delegates of the OIE in May 2013.
