“We are extremely proud of our veterinarians and their teams, who care for and treat hundreds of animals every year. Operating at all times within a framework of humane, justified and effective care, in the specified time frame, we rehabilitated and released 43 per cent of all koalas brought us for treatment, who may otherwise have suffered painful and unnecessarily slow deaths”.  Dr Jenny Gray, CEO, Zoos Victoria

^{Note: Werribee numbers in Table 2 exclude two koalas currently in care.
Note: In March 2019 Healesville Sanctuary received 2 Koalas from the fire grounds, one was released back into the wild, the other euthanised.}

‍

Jenny goes on to say, the most common presentations requiring humane euthanasia across both hospitals include being struck by cars, dog attacks and being found abandoned and in poor condition. During 2019 and 2020, many presentations were directly linked to bushfire injuries, and there were various major incidents impacting the koala population locally.

“At Zoos Victoria we have a duty of care to all wildlife, including the animals presented to our veterinary experts. The decision to euthanise an animal is not one that we take lightly. We practice euthanasia as a last resort only. The decision is based on compassion, to preventing the individual from suffering from illness, pain or injury, or to avoid a decline in their quality of life or prevent the extinction of a threatened species”.

‍