Researchers are racing to save Australia's koalas with a newly developed chlamydia vaccine. If not brought under control, the infectious disease may be a factor that drives the species to extinction.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00This is a Juni, an orphaned koala joey rescued from the side of the road in Sydney after
00:06her mother was hit by a car and killed.
00:08This is a common occurrence in Australia as the country's urban centres continue to rapidly
00:14expand, forcing the species to risk roads and dog attacks in search of eucalyptus trees
00:20or a mate.
00:21It's hard.
00:22It's hard at times.
00:23You know, seeing what we see, those 40 koalas that have been hit on Appen Road in the last
00:28two years, I've pretty much pulled every single one of those bodies off the road or taken
00:32them to the vet to be, you know, to die.
00:34So it's huge.
00:35It's a massive toll.
00:36But these iconic animals face another serious threat, one that may cause blindness, severe
00:42bladder inflammation, infertility or even death, chlamydia.
00:48Researchers believe the disease was introduced by livestock and koalas have no natural immunity
00:52to it.
00:54It could even wipe out the species if left unchecked.
00:57A large number of the populations have chlamydia within them.
01:02There's one really significant population in southwest Sydney which is chlamydia free
01:07and that's the population that everybody's very jealously guarding.
01:10There is no guarantee into the future that every one of the koalas that gets out doesn't
01:17become infected by a population that's close by and then come back in.
01:22According to the Australian Koala Foundation, the country saw a 30 per cent drop in the
01:26koala population from 2018 to 2021.
01:31Chlamydia is believed to be a significant cause of death.
01:34Fortunately, a university in the east of Australia says they may have a way to save the fluffy
01:39tree dwellers from the disease.
01:40We were able to show that a vaccine that targets a specific gene within chlamydia can have
01:47a positive effect on the koala population.
01:50Our plan is to roll this out as an addition to a lot of the methods that are currently
01:54being developed to protect koala populations that are at risk.
01:59To date, the researchers have vaccinated and monitored 165 koalas for a decade and found
02:05that inoculated koalas that developed chlamydia later in life had their mortality rate reduced
02:10by 64 per cent.
02:13Researchers say the vaccine has already led to a remarkable recovery for a koala population
02:18previously expected to vanish within a decade.
02:21Chlamydia vaccine research will probably be quite pivotal for populations that we're
02:27trying to protect from the disease of infertility if you like, but I have to stress that this
02:33research is in its infancy and in the immediate future there's no magic pill that's going
02:39to fix this chlamydia problem.
02:42While the effectiveness of this vaccine in eradicating chlamydia among koalas remains
02:46uncertain, animal activists remain resolute.
02:50They continue working for a future where these efforts will allow a new generation
02:54to witness koalas thriving in their natural habitats.
02:58John Su, Sandy Chee and Rosie Grenninger for Taiwan Plus.