The wildlife hypothesis best fits the data. Professor Roger Morris, the head of a research team at a New Zealand university, said the most likely explanation for the introduction of the disease was that the BSE-infected antelope ended up in meal fed to British cattle in the 1970s. The team used an advanced computer model to test possible theories to chart the spread of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy which ravaged the British beef industry in the 1990s.
Scientists believe imports of game to safari parks in the south west of England are to blame.
It is something that needs to be checked out very carefully. The problem is that antelopes that suffered from this disease will rapidly get eaten by lions and hyenas so finding an antelope in the wild that has the disease would be a major challenge, a needle in the haystack kind of thing. If you found an antelope with this disease in the wild, it would be possible to take the agent and compare it with BSE and similar disease. The Government inquiry into the British Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy crisis, published last October, traced the disease back to the 1970s when the report found the first cattle were probably infected. The report said BSE developed into an epidemic as a result of the recycling of animal remains in cattle feed.