CONNE RIVER, N.L. -- Almost 500,000 salmon in Newfoundland and Labrador will be destroyed due to an outbreak of infectious salmon anemia.
Gray Aqua Group confirmed the outbreak at one of their fish farms in Conne River in a release Saturday morning.
It says tests done by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency are conclusive.
Infectious salmon anemia is a naturally occurring virus that poses no risk to wild species such as lobster, cod and herring.
"We are taking this confirmed finding very seriously and are co-operating fully," said Gray Aqua Group vice-president Clyde Collier.
The Newfoundland and Labrador Aquaculture Industry Association couldn't be reached for comment, but executive director Miranda Pryor told radio station VOCM the virus can be carried by a number of fish in the Atlantic.
She said the salmon at the affected farm need to be destroyed to minimize the risk of transmitting the virus to other farming sites.
It isn't the first time a company has been ordered to destroy salmon.
Earlier this year, a Nova Scotia fish farm was ordered to destroy hundreds of thousands of salmon after a similar outbreak outside Shelburne Harbour.
Outbreaks of infectious salmon anemia in New Brunswick in the late 1990s dealt a blow to the aquaculture industry there at the time and the federal government provided tens of millions of dollars in compensation.
