Resumen de Medicine for poorly koalas is killing them
Curing chlamydia in koalas can be just as deadly as the disease itself. For now the best option seems to be antibiotics to kill the infection. But koalas often suffer serious side effects from antibiotics, so Katherine Dahlhausen at the University of California, Davis, and her colleagues tried to find out why. They gathered fecal samples from sick koalas and scanned them to see what microorganisms were present. Like many other animals, koalas have "friendly bacteria" living in their guts that help them digest food. The team found that antibiotics had little effect on most of the friendly bacteria, but one species was often wiped out: Lonepinella koalarum. This species is crucial because it breaks down harmful tannins, allowing the koalas to digest the tough eucalyptus leaves that make up most of their diet.
