On a species level though, the disease, which spreads through bodily fluids, causes even greater ruin.

Chlamydia is not uncommon in other animals – koalas are suspected to have first caught it from livestock – but the spread and intensity of the disease amongst the marsupials is unmatched.

Experts estimate around half of koalas in Queensland and New South Wales could be infected, but just a suburb away from Currumbin, in Elanora, that has climbed beyond 80%.

It is the most diseased population in the region and numbers have been “falling off a cliff”, Dr Payne says. “It’s a disaster.”

Enter the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) and their vaccine, which aims to prevent and treat chlamydia in koalas and has been almost two decades in the making.

Alongside Currumbin, they’re trying to save the Elanora koalas from oblivion: capturing 30 youngsters and vaccinating them, before recatching them at intervals over three years to track their health.

So far only three of the vaccinated koalas in this research trial have contracted the disease, though all recovered, and encouragingly, more than two dozen joeys have been born – bucking the infertility trend.

“There’s generations of koalas now that have come through. We’ve got grand joeys,” Dr Payne says excitedly.

Currumbin has also been vaccinating every koala which comes through their hospital, and have reached about 400 koalas this way.

But treating and vaccinating each koala with chlamydia costs them about A$7,000 (£3,500, $4,500). Capturing, jabbing, and tracking each wild Elanora koala is basically double that.