Media release – Tasmanian Alliance for Marine Protection, 14 November 2022
TAMP uncovers ANTIBIOTIC DUMPS IN TASMANIAN WATERS: “They must be halted immediately”
In another mockery of the claim to be “world’s best practice”, it’s been revealed that the salmon industry has dumped more than a tonne of antibiotics in the waters around Bruny Island this year.
It took an alert member of the Tasmanian Alliance for Marine Protection (TAMP) burrowing deeply into bureaucratic records to discover and alert the public to a practice neither industry nor government want exposed.
“This is an indictment of the industry’s practices and of a government regulator that allows huge quantities of antibiotics to be poured into salmon pens and then spread through nearby waters regardless of the impact on human health and marine life,” says Peter George, chair of TAMP
“The use of antibiotic dumps on diseased salmon is dangerous and unnecessary and must be banned immediately.
“World’s best practice – which is what industry and government claim – is to vaccinate salmon against diseases that obviate the need for antibiotic treatment.
“But vaccinations cost more than antibiotic dumps and the industry clearly values profits over concerns about their impact on human and marine health.
“In this year alone, the industry’s used enough antibiotics in their pens to treat the entire Tasmanian population.
“A scientific investigation earlier this year discovered more than a third of salmon sold to consumers was antibiotic resistant – a major issue to global medical authorities concerned about growing human resistance to life-saving treatments.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-05-04/antibiotic-resistance-study-agriculture-food-chain/101037200
“It’s extraordinary that the EPA, the Health Department and the industry regulator let the industry get away with covert dumps of antibiotics with no warning of contamination for swimmers and fishers who have a right to know.”
“Now that the industry has been bought-out by foreign multinationals to whom Premier Jeremy Rockliff has privately guaranteed more waters for expansion, we can expect worse practices more carefully covered-up at the expense of Tasmanians and their waterways.” (The Mercury, Hobart, Friday Nov 11)
Rosalie Woodruff MP, Greens Environment spokesperson, 14 November 2022
Salmon Farmers’ Antibiotic Contamination Chilling
News more than a tonne of antibiotic-spiked feed have been silently dumped into salmon pens, also contaminating native fish and marine sediments, is chilling. This is a hemisphere away from world’s best practice, and shows the Liberal government’s willingness to prioritise cost-cutting for salmon corporations over the protection of Tasmania’s marine environment and brand.
The Tasmanian Inquirer revealed nearly 1.1 tonnes of antibiotics were added to fish feed by Tassal and Huon in a crude attempt to stop outbreaks of vibrio bacteria in their leases earlier this year. The news excessive antibiotics levels persisted above reporting thresholds in native fish and marine sediment for weeks and months was effectively buried from fishers and the wider community. Without the accidental discovery by the Tasmanian Alliance for Marine Protection of an online report to the EPA, this information would still be secret.
Wild fish identified as being contaminated at high levels with broad-spectrum antibiotics included flathead, jack mackerel, blue mackerel and barracouta. The impact on natural marine microbial activity in the benthic layer under salmon pens, and beyond, has been disregarded and unresearched by the EPA.
Concerns about the broadscale over-application of antibiotics in animal feed, and the creation of drug-resistant superbugs, have been voiced for decades. It appears Tasmanian salmon is lagging far behind industry standards in failing to rule out wider environmental impacts.
Antibiotic use in the salmon industry is highly regulated in Norway, which mandates mechanical vaccination of salmon against diseases like Vibrio. In Tasmania, it appears our only regulations involve monitoring for gross threshold exceedances after the fact, and then quietly hiding the report.
The Minister for Primary Industries, Jo Palmer, needs to end all antibiotic use in salmon feed, and require companies to vaccinate fish. This is world’s best practice, and essential to ensuring wider environmental harm is not caused by salmon multinationals’ current indiscriminate use of antibiotics.
