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<div class=Section1>

<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>A
mysterious virus that has decimated tilapia fish stocks in Ecuador and Israel
has finally been identified by an international team of scientists.<strong><span
style='font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></strong></span></p>

<p class=MsoNormal><strong><span style='font-size:18.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>Deadly
fish virus finally identified</span></strong><span style='font-size:18.0pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'><a
href="http://www.scidev.net/global/author.pablo-correa-torres.html"><span
style='color:windowtext;text-decoration:none'><o:p></o:p></span></a></span></p>

<p class=MsoNormal><span lang=ES style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'><a
href="http://www.scidev.net/global/author.pablo-correa-torres.html"><span
style='color:windowtext;text-decoration:none'>Pablo Correa Torres</span><span
style='color:windowtext;text-decoration:none'><o:p></o:p></span></a></span></p>

<p class=MsoNormal><span lang=ES style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>29/04/16</span><span
lang=ES style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>

<p class=MsoNormal><span lang=ES style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>http://www.scidev.net/global/fisheries/news/deadly-fish-virus-finally-identified.html?utm_medium=email&utm_source=SciDevNewsletter&utm_campaign=international%20SciDev.Net%20update%3A%203%20May%202016<o:p></o:p></span></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:13.5pt'><span lang=ES style='font-size:
10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'><br>
<br>
</span><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>The
virus, dubbed tilapia lake virus, was long suspected to be behind mass die offs
of valuable farmed tilapia in Ecuador and Israel since 2009. In a paper<span
class=apple-converted-space> </span><a
href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1128/mBio.00431-16"><span style='color:windowtext'>published
in the journal</span><span class=apple-converted-space><span style='color:windowtext;
text-decoration:none'> </span></span><em><span style='font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:windowtext;text-decoration:none'>mBio</span></em><span
class=apple-converted-space><span style='color:windowtext;text-decoration:none'> </span></span><span
style='color:windowtext'>last month</span></a><span
class=apple-converted-space> </span>(5 April), the researchers say that
nine of the ten genome segments they have identified are unrelated to any other
known virus.<br>
<br>
“Our findings suggest that tilapia lake virus represents a novel virus,
and confirm that it poses a global threat to tilapia aquaculture,” says
joint lead author Eran Bacharach, a virologist at Tel Aviv University in
Israel.<br>
<br>
The virus causes lethargy, skin flaking and kidney problems in infected fish,
which ultimately kills them.<br>
<br>
Tilapia lake virus caused stocks of farmed fish to plummet by 85 per cent in
Israel, making the disease a concern for scientists and fish farmers alike. The
research effort that resulted in the paper was down to a collaboration between
institutes in Israel, the United Kingdom, the United States and the West
Indies.<br>
<br>
<a
href="http://www.scidev.net/global/technology/multimedia/hack-aquaculture-tilapia-WSN.html"><span
style='color:windowtext'>Tilapia fish aquaculture</span></a><span
class=apple-converted-space> </span>became popular (see graph) as fish
stocks in the oceans dwindled in the 1990s through overfishing. The global
tilapia trade is worth an estimated US$7.5 billion a year, according to the
paper. The largest producers are China, Ecuador, Egypt, Indonesia and Thailand,
while the largest importer is the United States.<o:p></o:p></span></p>

<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center;line-height:13.5pt'><span
style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'> <o:p></o:p></span></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:13.5pt'><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>Before the virus emerged, tilapia farms only
had to protect their stock from bacteria and fungi, says Margy Villanueva, the
leader of the National Sanitary Program for Aquaculture Species at the
Colombian Agricultural Institute, who has worked with the international
consortium. Colombia is still waiting for scientific results to confirm that
its mass tilapia die off in 2009 was caused by the tilapia lake virus.<br>
<br>
“Now we need a better understanding of the virus epidemiology, its
biological properties, infectious capacity and routes of contagion,”
Villanueva says. “But, above all, farmers must report any cases and
establish biosecurity measures”, she says, such as disinfecting new fish
and destroying affected fish stocks.<o:p></o:p></span></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:13.5pt'><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='line-height:13.5pt'><span style='font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>Biosecurity can be an issue in countries with
weak reporting systems, says Francisco Forero, a fish researcher at Jorge Tadeo
Lozano University in Bogota, Colombia.<br>
<br>
“The problem in many countries, as in Colombia, is that there are no
controls when [new fish stocks] are introduced,” he says. “And
producers break the biosecurity rules everywhere.” <o:p></o:p></span></p>

<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>

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