Australia is in the midst of a chlamydia epidemic and it is koalas , not humans , who are at risk .
The tenor that affect these cuddly - front marsupials from the land down under is especially unpleasant and can often be deadly . Unfortunately , according to a paper published inPeerJ , the medicament being used to treat the STI could be making the position a whole tidy sum worse .
Koala chlamydia is an extremely painful condition that is transmitted through sexual practice or through spoon food , a specialised form of BM used by mothers to wean joeys . It is forecast to affect somewhere between50 and 100 percentof the wild universe .
Even in case that do n’t demonstrate fatal , chlamydia can cause urinary tract infection , sightlessness , and sterility . All of which is exceedingly bad news fora vulnerable speciesthat has seen numbers decline by33 percentin just two decade .
Achlamydia vaccineis in the pipeline but for now , most causa are handle with a generous battery-acid of antibiotics . The drugs kill the transmission . The matter is , they also kill a type of intestine bacteria calledL. koalarum , which is all important to the koala ’s survival .
The report , led by Katherine Dahlhausen at the University of California Davis , analyzed the bacteria in 141 fecal sample distribution from eleven koalas find charge for chlamydia . Nine were being treat with antibiotics and two were not .
L. koalarumwas one of four type of “ friendly intestine bacteria ” present before and after treatment in those that survived but was miss in one koala that die after antibiotic treatment .
The bacterium is responsible for break away down tannin , a means found in eucalypt folio . Because eucalyptus leaves make up the vast majority of a koala ’s diet and because tannic acid can be extremely harmful if not right broken down , a deficit ofL. koalarumin the gut essentially stimulate the koala to starve to death .
So , what now ?
The chlamydia vaccinum wo n’t be available for some time and there are currently no experience character of antibiotic drug that can kill chlamydia while protect gut bacteria . Instead , Dahlhausen toldNew Scientist , “ faecal transplants may be the best method for offsetting the damaging effect of antibiotic ” – at least for the time being .
She impart , the finding are preliminary so there may be other bacterium also affected by the antibiotic treatment .
The next stage is to monitor koalas over a longer timescale and sour out how exactly the antibiotics affect a female parent ’s pap .
