The animals are riddled with the disease—but help may be coming in the form of vaccines
Save time by listening to our audio articles as you multitaskThis is more than just a matter of embarrassment in polite marsupial society. Chlamydia causes conjunctivitis, which can blind a koala. Worse is a brown bottom. That implies that the disease has led to a bad urinary infection and incontinence. Those animals are hard to save, says Michael Pyne, a vet at Currumbin Wildlife Hospital in Queensland. Often the infection spreads to the kidneys, leading to renal failure.
It is not just that randy koalas are spreading disease the old-fashioned way. Females feed their joeys a kind of faeces called “pap” to pass on nutrients from eucalyptus leaves. That transmits the infection, too. Koalas do not respond well to antibiotics, which disrupt the bacteria they need to break down food.
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