Question Period Note: New study on Aquaculture and Piscine Orthoreovirus (PRV)

• The health of Pacific salmon stocks is of critical concern to the Department.
• Through Budget 2021, we will be investing $647 million over five years, starting in 2021, to stabilize and conserve wild Pacific salmon populations.
• Fisheries and Oceans Canada draws on science from a range of sources in pursuit of its goal to restore and revive wild Pacific salmon.
• As new information becomes available, the Department remains open to reviewing and incorporating the information as part of its adaptive management process.

If pressed on PRV research
• Fisheries and Oceans Canada supports and welcomes new research on factors affecting wild salmon survival including - research on habitat monitoring and conservation; climate change impacts; run timing and migration of salmon stocks; and, genetic and pathogen risks including potentially those associated with various strains of PRV.
• As information on any particular disease may evolve, the Department continues to ensure that the actions taken to understand and mitigate disease risks are also responsive.

• On May 27, 2021, a paper entitled Aquaculture mediates global transmission of a viral pathogen to wild salmon was published in the journal Science Advances. The University of British Columbia has put out a press release given the lead author is a faculty member.
• For the study, researchers applied sequence-based phylogenetic models using full genome sequences of PRV to elucidate the movement and evolution of PRV-1 around the globe. They conclude that PRV has been repeatedly introduced to new continents through movements of fish for aquaculture, that the variant of PRV found in BC is a relatively recent introduction from the North Atlantic (approximately 30-40 years ago), and that aquaculture farms are a source of PRV infections to wild salmon.
• The authors suggest that PRV-1 is “now an important infectious agent in critically endangered wild Pacific salmon populations, fueled by aquaculture transmission”.
• The Department acknowledges that there remain many unknowns regarding PRV and that the scientific investigation of PRV continues. DFO has demonstrated its commitment to open review and consideration of a range of scientific expertise on various pathogens and diseases, through multiple Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat (CSAS) peer reviews, and recently, through the Fish Health Technical Working Group (FHTWG) to consider a range of information for multiple pathogens and diseases that have variable characterizations.
• DFO has initiated a one-time study to be conducted over a two-year period that will also augment ongoing research programs examining the distribution of PRV in all freshwater hatcheries.
• DFO has also expanded its fish health audit program; including increased frequency and breadth of scope for marine monitoring, enhanced reporting requirements, epidemiological analysis, and the development of a freshwater fish health audit program. This program will enhance surveillance for HSMI and jaundice/anemia across a broad range of farms.
• Along with results from the broadened surveillance of PRV in association with hatcheries and disease outbreaks on farms, this study, which offers additional evidence on the evolution and transmission of PRV in BC, will be considered as part of the full body of evidence in future decisions pertaining to the regulation of PRV.

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