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[chris gadsden]

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/ottawa-moves-against-pei-lab-that-reported-virus-in-bc-salmon/article5582798/

[chris gadsden]

http://alexandramorton.typepad.com/alexandra_morton/2012/11/cfia-wants-to-strip-lab-of-status.html

[StillAqua]

http://metronews.ca/news/canada/452004/foreign-complaint-behind-audit-of-pei-lab/

".....Guy Gravelle, a spokesman for the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, said in an email Friday that an OIE member country had become concerned because the facility’s work on samples from that country were not consistent with findings from other researchers......."

You have wonder why Kibenge's lab can "find" genetic ISA virus signatures where many other labs using similar techniques can not. When you're amplifying single fragments of DNA/RNA, the potential for false positives is huge without very strict lab and analytical protocols. That seems to be basis for the independent lab audit that his lab came up short in. If it's true that sloppy lab procedures are the problem, he's done a grave disservice to the science and public debate.

[EZ_Rolling]

With the only other approved lab being in Ummm Norway there is no doubt in my mind you would get conflicting reports.

[dnibbles]

With the only other approved lab being in Ummm Norway there is no doubt in my mind you would get conflicting reports.

why is there no doubt you would get different results? I would hope that if I to a doctor for a blood test in Norway they would be able to diagnose me the same as they do in Canada.

[alwaysfishn]

http://metronews.ca/news/canada/452004/foreign-complaint-behind-audit-of-pei-lab/

".....Guy Gravelle, a spokesman for the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, said in an email Friday that an OIE member country had become concerned because the facility’s work on samples from that country were not consistent with findings from other researchers......."

You have wonder why Kibenge's lab can "find" genetic ISA virus signatures where many other labs using similar techniques can not. When you're amplifying single fragments of DNA/RNA, the potential for false positives is huge without very strict lab and analytical protocols. That seems to be basis for the independent lab audit that his lab came up short in. If it's true that sloppy lab procedures are the problem, he's done a grave disservice to the science and public debate.

Let's not forget that it was Kibenge's Lab that discovered the ISA virus in the Chile farmed salmon which was eventually traced back to Norway.

That has to raise a lot of questions, like why didn't the Norwegian lab detect ISA in Chile? Shouldn't they perhaps be questioning the CFIA's scientists results and the other "researchers" results rather than the results from someone who has proven he knows what he is doing?

[alwaysfishn]

why is there no doubt you would get different results? I would hope that if I to a doctor for a blood test in Norway they would be able to diagnose me the same as they do in Canada.

I think EZ was probably referring to the fact that the Norwegian government is heavily invested in the feedlot business. Finding ISA in feedlot salmon isn't very good for business.

[shuswapsteve]

Funny how antis do not like the recent conspiracy theories directed towards Ms Morton, but are now basically insinuating that the other OIE reference lab (National Veterinary Institute in Norway) with a very long history of ISA research and detection is corrupted by government. Most of the science on ISAV and ISA is from places like Norway.  They do know what they are doing.  Dr. Nylund, a Norwegian scientist who testified at the Cohen Inquiry with Dr. Kristi Miller and Dr. Kilbenge, is a renowned expert in ISA.  One thing that is being forgotten here is that it is the OIE that made the recommendation to suspend the Atlantic Veterinary College’s ISA reference designation – not the CFIA.  Currently, the National Veterinary Institute in Norway is not being audited by the OIE.  If antis are going to accept the OIE as being reference authority on issues like this then they should not have any problem with them doing their job in this regard.  In my opinion, this audit does not mean that the AVC will never have that reference designation again or that Dr. Kilbenge is bad scientist.  If something is substandard at AVC then it is in everyone’s interests to find out what it is and correct it.  Being called a “OIE reference laboratory” means that you uphold certain standards that other labs may not have, so if the OIE did not take this seriously then they would not being doing their jobs either to protect their own reputation.      

Remember that particular paper about PRV and HSMI that was brought up in another thread in this forum that many antis claimed solidified the theory that there was a causal relationship between PRV and HSMI?  Well, many of those scientists that co-authored that paper are employees at the National Veterinary Institute in Norway.  Many of those same scientists went on to publish other reports on PRV which shed doubts on those claims.

[dnibbles]

Never trust a man with a moustache.

[Dave]

I wonder if Ms. Morton will be refunding the estimated $37,000 she has collected from otherwise well meaning people for these now even more questionable laboratory results?  I also wonder how many people will now donate the estimated $63,000 still needed to complete her sample analysis or for her next call for cash.
Would you?
If so, please contact me as I have some snakeoil for sale

Nib, you can trust me

[alwaysfishn]

I wonder if Ms. Morton will be refunding the estimated $37,000 she has collected from otherwise well meaning people for these now even more questionable laboratory results? 

Questionable results??  He's the guy that found the ISA virus when all the other labs couldn't or wouldn't......  It brought a $3 billion/year Chilean feedlot business to it's knees and resulted in more than 13,000 lost jobs.

I'm sure the feedlot business wishes that Dr Kibenge had never found ISA.....  and getting rid of his Lab will mean they don't have to deal with him....  That way they can continue to deny ISA's existence in BC while the wild salmon die.

http://www.puresalmon.org/pdfs/ISA-backgrounder.pdf

[alwaysfishn]

Funny how antis do not like the recent conspiracy theories .........

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/british-columbia/federal-agency-accused-of-intimidation-over-salmon-disease/article554785/

"Scientists who uncovered the first signs that infectious salmon anemia is present on the West Coast have found themselves shunned and intimidated by federal government officials, the Cohen Commission has heard.

Fred Kibenge, chair of the department of pathology and microbiology at the University of Prince Edward Island, said the credibility of his laboratory came under attack shortly after he reported getting two positive tests for the ISA virus in 48 sockeye salmon samples. Those samples were sent to him in October by a Simon Fraser University researcher, Rick Routledge, who was trying to figure out why so many salmon were dying on B.C.’s Central Coast.

No lethal virus in Pacific salmon, CFIA says

Professor Routledge held a highly publicized press conference to announce the virus, which has triggered devastating disease outbreaks in Atlantic salmon farms in Norway and Chile, had been found for the first time in B.C. waters.

Dr. Kibenge said shortly after SFU went public he was called by government officials who had questions about how his lab operated.

Dr. Kibenge told the Cohen Commission, which is inquiring into the collapse of sockeye salmon stocks in the Fraser River, that he initially thought the CFIA was interested in finding how his lab could work co-operatively with a DFO lab they use for ISA testing, in Moncton, New Brunswick.

But he said after officials arrived, he realized they were really more interested in finding faults with his operation as a means to undermine the credibility of his ISA virus findings.

“You’ve been really quite attacked,” said Gregory McDade, lawyer for two conservation groups and Alexandra Morton, a researcher and salmon farm critic.

“Yeah, I would say that, but I can understand where the government is coming from,” replied Dr. Kibenge.

Entered as evidence at the commission was a CFIA audit, which found fault with Dr. Kibenge’s lab, saying the “potential for cross contamination does exist” at his lab.

But Dr. Kibenge refuted that contention, saying the complaint was groundless and that he is confident his tests were not contaminated.

His lab is one of only a handful certified by the World Organization for Animal Health for ISA testing and he is a recognized expert on the virus.

Mr. McDade suggested to Dr. Kibenge that had he reported negative results for the ISA virus, he wouldn’t have been subject to any CFIA scrutiny.

“I agree, yeah,” he said. “Negative findings are very easy to deal with. . .it’s the positive findings that are difficult to accept.”

Dr. Kibenge’s lab in 2007 confirmed the first occurrence of ISA in farmed Atlantic salmon in Chile, where the virus triggered a disease outbreak that killed millions of salmon.

“The spread of diseases is the most feared threat to aquaculture,” he stated in a presentation on ISA that was filed as evidence.

Earlier in testimony Dr. Kristi Miller, head of molecular genetics for the Department of Fisheries and Oceans at the federal Pacific Biological Station, said she has felt isolated within her own department since recently reporting multiple positive tests for the ISA virus.

Dr. Miller said that after the SFU press conference on ISA, she initiated her own research, and quickly found the sequence for the virus in both farmed and wild salmon.

But she said officials in Ottawa weren’t happy to learn she had been doing the research on her own initiative, and she soon felt shunned.

“I’m pretty alienated in the department at the moment so the end result of all of this is I’m not included in any conversations about any of this [ISA research]” she said.

“Once I reported this information . . . nobody in the department talked to me about disease or ISA after that,” said Dr. Miller.

The Cohen Commission has also heard that Molly Kibenge, Dr. Kibenge’s wife, had found evidence of the ISA virus in 2002 and 2003 while doing research at the Pacific Biological Station. But DFO denied her request to publish that research, saying her findings were in doubt because another lab failed to repeat her findings."

[shuswapsteve]

(Sigh)…….The point being made was that it was funny that antis were coming up with their own conspiracy theory regarding the OIE reference lab in Norway after complaining about similar conspiracy theories labelled against Ms Morton regarding spreading ISA infected fish.  If the conspiracy theories alleged against Ms Morton were so outrageous then why come up with more conspiracy theories against the other OIE reference laboratory which have no factual basis?  I thought two wrongs don’t make a right….lol.  Antis should realize that they are basically knocking the OIE when they do this – the same organization they have been turning to for validation of their claims.   As for conspiracy theories against the CFIA in the media article posted it seems as though only one side of the story is being displayed.  This is where it is better to go to the actual testimony during the Cohen Inquiry.  Again, the OIE is the one taking action in regard to the AVC lab in PEI.  Even Don Reynolds, dean of the AVC, is quoted as saying that it was the OIE that made the recommendation to suspend the designation.

http://www.vancouversun.com/health/Audit+Atlantic+Veterinary+College+sparked+foreign+complaint/7603199/story.html

Secondly, Dr. Kibenge did not find ISA in fish samples from BC waters.  One is the virus and the other is the disease.  Kibenge believes that the ISAV found to date here are ISA virus sequences or ISA virus-like.  As of December 2011, according to Cohen, there is no evidence that the fish tested suffered from ISA.

“As stated in Volume 1, Chapter 9, Fish health management, I find that the evidence does not allow me to conclude whether ISAv or an ISAv-like virus currently exists in Fraser River sockeye. However, I accept the opinion of the expert panel (Dr. Kibenge, Dr. Nylund, Ms. Gagné, and Dr. Miller) that, as of December 2011, there was no evidence that fish tested for ISAv (the virus) suffered from ISA (the disease) as that disease was then understood.” – Justice Bruce Cohen; Volume 2, Chapter 2, Decline-Related Evidence, page 60.

I am not sure if samples from Chile were ever sent to the OIE reference lab in Norway; however, it should be noted that ISA was first described in Norway in 1984 and that country is probably one of the leading places in the world in research into ISA.   A total of 438 outbreaks have been reported in Norway during the time period from 1984 to 2005 (Lyngstad et al 2007), so I would find it hard to believe that this particular area of the globe is resistant to finding ISA or cannot find it.  If these Norwegian scientists were trying to protect the Norwegian government from embarrassing ISA results then I highly doubt they would be diligent enough to monitor and document ISA occurrences in Norwegian fish farms and post them on their website for the public to see.  Do not take my word for it – go to the Norwegian Veterinary Institute website and see what they are doing.  The reports are right there for anyone to read.  Lastly, DFO biologists have already detected ISAV in amongst wild and farmed Atlantic Salmon populations in New Brunswick (can be found in the puresalmon.org website you posted).


http://www.vetinst.no/eng/Publications/Report-Series

[shuswapsteve]

Never trust a man with a moustache.

You can trust me, nibbles...lol.  I'm counting the days....However, it is for a good cause (prostate cancer) and it brings awareness to getting tested.

[dnibbles]

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