The Australian government would consider a public inquiry into the equine influenza epidemic which has ravaged it’s racing industry if investigations show the disease emanated from its own quarantine facility, agriculture minister Peter McGauran said Saturday.

The federal government has been under pressure to order a public inquiry to determine how the disease, which has swept through horses in New South Wales and Queensland states, beat biosecurity checks and spread into the general horse population.

Hundreds of horses in Queensland and New South Wales states have become infected and the horse racing industries in both states have closed down indefinitely as efforts are made to contain the disease.

McGauran said the government had 19 investigators working to determine whether there had been a breach of biosecurity at the Eastern Creek quarantine center at which the disease was first identified