Queensland researchers have developed a new management approach that could save koalas from extinction. 

University of Queensland researchers say more can be done to protect populations and describe the current management as opportunistic rather than coordinated.

Through ongoing efforts, including vet treatment and the addition of new healthy koalas, they believe the numbers can be turned around.

Koala populations in Queensland, NSW and the ACT were listed as endangered by the federal government earlier this year.

For two years, the researchers focused on a colony in Carindale bushland where 60 per cent of the population was infected with chlamydia and declining.

It’s believed the group has now largely recovered.

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