BREAKING: Cooke Aquaculture Confirms Salmon Virus Scare

(Photo: courtesy of SouthCoastToday.ca)

Cooke Aquaculture says it has a suspected outbreak of the infectious salmon anemia virus at one of its fish farms. In a statement, the seafood company says it destroyed thousands of fish contained in two cages at one of its fish farming sites after routine tests and surveillance of its stocks. But the company declined to say where the outbreak is suspected. It's believed the fish farm in question is located in Shelburne. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency is investigating, but it too declined to say where the suspected outbreak is located. Dr. Con Kiley, director of the agency's aquatic animal health program says the virus is not a human health or food risk. "I think the important thing to say is that it is not confirmed to date, the other thing is people need to understand is that infectious salmon anemia is not a human health or food safety issue...it's not,"He says tests will be conducted at a federal lab in Moncton to confirm whether the virus is present.

Tenders close for LCLC; decision coming next week

The chair of the Lunenburg County Lifestyle Centre hopes the winning tender for the project will be announced in the next week. Paul Belliveau says the tender process closed earlier this week with eight construction companies vying to build the centre. Bird Construction of Halifax had the lowest bid at just over $24-million. If that group wins the bid, Belliveau says they would need to fundraise roughly $500-thousand to meet the budget needs. He doesn't expect to approach local governments for more funding. Belliveau says they're looking good.

"So at this point, to come in that we're roughly very close to our budget, we're going to have a facility that looks roughly like what we wanted it to look like and we maintained the integrity of having all of the components, I think we're in pretty good shape. We said that we would try and deliver something within the 33.5-million dollar range and I think we're going to get there."

Construction is still planned to start around mid-March, with the project pegged to be completed by next spring.

BREAKING: Thousands of Salmon Destroyed Because of Viral Scare

Thousands of fish have been destroyed because of a suspected finding of infectious salmon anemia in Nova Scotia. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency is investigating the matter but would not confirm the location of the potential finding. The suspected case of ISA is believed to be at a fish farm in Shelburne owned by New Brunswick based Cooke Aquaculture. Director of the National Aquatic and Animal Health Program for CFIA, Dr. Con Kiley says samples have already been sent to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans laboratory in Moncton for testing. "The disease has not been confirmed to date, the agency with the co-operation of the company has place a quarantine on the facility. That means we have disease control measures in place and confirmatory testing is underway and results are expected over the next few weeks," ISA is a flu-like virus that affects Atlantic salmon. It is harmless to the public but it is the single most feared virus in the fish industry because its highly contagious and impact on wild salmon populations.

Conservatives Focus on South Shore Ridings

The leader of Nova Scotia's PC Party spent time with South Shore residents Thursday night in Bridgewater. Jamie Baillie held a question and answer session at the Bridgewater Fire Hall. In a sit down interview with CKBW/HANK-FM, Baillie tells us he wasn't happy during last election after the NDP swept all the seats along the South Shore. But, Baillie looks forward to the next election because local NDP MLAs have to face the music for decisions they've made."Like, Lunenburg West - Gary Ramey, like, Lunenburg Pam Birdsall who have to answer to the people of the South Shore why they voted with the back room union interests with the NDP and against those jobs at places like Michelin. I am very proud to say we are with them - the employees of Michelin and the ones that want to work there in fighting that bill bu they didn't stand with their own constituents," Baillie says the South Shore region is important to his party because he feels the NDP has forgotten about residents.