Outrageous and baseless allegation against Irish salmon farmers

THE IRISH Examiner (July 1) published a letter from a Dr Roderick O’Sullivan that was completely erroneous, and was highly damaging to the reputation and image of a clearly identifiable Irish company and to an entire sector of the Irish seafood business.

Dr O'Sullivan takes as the starting point for his inaccurate letter an article which appeared in the UK edition of The Sunday Times of June 5.

Sadly, he chose to ignore the later Irish edition of the paper which retracted the allegations in an earlier edition and published the fact that the contamination did not in fact take place at an Irish salmon farm.

This farm is identified in the article and can clearly be identified in the letter published by you. The letter also quotes the farm's production manager, and this is lifted from the same Sunday Times article.

Subsequent to June 5 a series of statements by the British supermarket in question and the Veterinary Medicines Directorate (VMD) were published which totally exonerated the fish farm and clearly identified that the source of contamination was, in fact, within the supermarket itself.

The VMD, so liberally misquoted by Dr O'Sullivan, has clearly identified the source of contamination as paper towels used by the supermarket's own fish filleting service not the Irish salmon farm, as claimed by Dr O'Sullivan.

The fact is that information is widely available which completely disproves Dr O'Sullivan's outrageous and baseless allegation that "Irish salmon farmers still flout the law and continue to play Russian roulette with consumers' health."

Richie Flynn

Executive Secretary

IFA Aquaculture

Irish Farm Centre

Bluebell

Dublin 12