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School Turns Into A Hospital For Koalas Orphaned And Injured By Australia’s Wildfires
In Adelaide, Australia, the school gymnasium at Paradise Primary School has received a transformation into a make-shift koala hospital – complete with hospital beds made out of foldable playpens.
According to Daily Mail and People Magazine, the impromptu emergency room was set up by the Adelaide Koala Rescue, and has already taken in dozens of koalas injured by the Cuddle Creek Fire – one of many wildfires that have been raging across Australia since September.
As 7 News reports, the small makeshift hospital has been staffed by more than 150 volunteers, many of them veterinarians, who are helping to provide around the clock care for these injured koalas.
All the koalas are separated into different pens depending on their needs and circumstances. There are pens for orphaned koalas, burned koalas, and even one for koalas who have chlamydia – something that is surprisingly but unfortunately very common amongst koalas.
Jane Brister, director of Adelaide Koala Rescue, spoke to the Daily Mail about some of the recent patients in the hospital and said, “We’ve had a few come in that were just singed all over. It’s almost as though they were curled in a ball when the flames, the heat just went straight over the top of them.”
All of the koala patients have received names and medical charts, and they are being closely monitored throughout their recoveries. Once the staff feel that one of their patients is fully healed and able to climb and live happily outside, the koala is then released back into the wild.
Adelaide Koala Rescue has already released dozens of recovered koalas back into the bits of bush that were unaffected by Australia’s wildfires.
These successful releases are thanks in part to the outpouring of kindness the rescue has received from strangers – including the more than $147,000 donations gifted to the rescue’s GoFundMe page.
“We’ve also got people volunteering to come and deliver browse (trees) for the koalas, we’ve got people volunteering to wash all the towels that we go through for the bedding. The community support has been wonderful,” said Brister.
The koalas under the care of Adelaide Koala Rescue are the lucky ones, as experts are estimating that more than a billion animals have been killed in the Australian bushfires – a tragedy which has potentially left some species close to extinction.
Anastasia is an American writer and journalist living in Dublin, Ireland. Her Twitter is @AnastasiaArell5.
