If these tests are accurate (BC has consistently manipulated their tests results), then this is good news. However, with the disease found just north of us, it requires ongoing testing and vigilance if we want to protect our wild stocks (and the investments of hundreds of millions of dollars over the decades we have spent as taxpayers). It is good to see that there are two labs involved in the testing, and that the Tribes are also in the loop on the process. The NW Indian Fisheries Commission is certainly a credible independent voice for wild salmon.
Recent tests of salmon from Washington’s waters show no signs of a fish virus that can be deadly to farm-raised Atlantic salmon, state, tribal and federal resource managers announced today. Infectious Salmon Anemia Virus (ISAV) was not detected in tissue samples taken from more than 900 wild and hatchery-produced Pacific chinook, coho, sockeye, chum and steelhead, as well as farm-raised Atlantic salmon. ISAV is not harmful to people. Specific strains of the virus have caused a deadly disease in farm-raised Atlantic salmon. Outbreaks with significant losses have occurred in farmed Atlantic salmon in Maine, Eastern Canada, Chile and several European countries. ISAV has not been documented in farmed, wild or hatchery salmon in Washington.