They're cute, they're cuddly... and they can give you chlamydia: So don't hug the koalas



A mother koala and her son (or 'joey') perch on a tree: However the cuddly creatures may be carrying an STD

Of all the ways to catch chlamydia - and none of them are great - this is surely the most novel.

There is a huge outbreak of chlamydia among koala species in Australia - and they can pass the disease on to humans through direct contact.

Researchers were investigating the sudden decrease in koala numbers around different cities around Australia, after spotting a population drop of 45 per cent in the cities, and 15 per cent in natural countryside.

What they found was shocking - the koalas had picked up chlamydia, and it was running rampant across the population, spread by matching, fighting, birth and in waste products.

And the infection can spread to humans - based on a perfect storm of humans wanting to hug the creatures, and the creatures not being too fussy about when and where they urinate.

In fact, Harry Stiles and Liam Payne, both from the band One Direction, had a health scare a few months ago when a koala decided to pee as he was lifted by the band members in Brisbane.

Payne, before getting the all-clear, told the Sun: 'I'm genuinely scared. This is worrying. I'd have never picked the thing up if I'd known.'

The effects of the disease include severe conjunctivitis, incontinence and kidney damage.

It is not known how koalas first got infected, but it gets spread through sexual sexual contact and when mother rear their babies.

There are fewer than 80,000 - perhaps as few as 43,000 - koalas left in Australia, according to the Australian Koala Foundation.

Researcher William Ellis told AOL that the problem is so serious that: 'We’re looking at a situation where koalas in southeast Queensland would be functionally extinct.'