Video Shows Koala Taking Himself To Hospital

An impromptu visit by a koala to a hospital's A&E department has become a social media sensation after the whole thing was caught on CCTV.

Hospital chiefs in Hamilton, which is about 185 miles west of Melbourne, said the inquisitive marsupial appeared "very casual" as he wandered through the corridors.

Video of the episode has gone viral and the koala has been nicknamed "Blinky Bill" after a mischievous cartoon koala popular in Australia in the 1930s.

Western District Health Service chief executive Rohan Fitzgerald said: "He was a koala that knew his own mind.

"He came in around about 3.27am, the electronic eye on the doors picked him up and he accessed the waiting room by himself.

"He walked around the waiting room for three minutes and then propped in front of the external doors and the eye of the doors picked him up again and he exited the waiting room.

"That was his experience in the hospital's emergency department."

Mr Fitzgerald said koalas were known to enter back gardens in the area, but he had never seen one as brazen as "Blinky Bill".

He said: "Blinky Bill was a little koala. He was quite mischievous and he liked to go and explore things ... he's a bit of an Australian icon really, as far as koalas go."

Footage of the hospital visit, which happened on 20 April but was only posted on Facebook this week, had been viewed more than 40,000 times by Tuesday morning.

The koala has been under increasing threat across Australia in recent decades, faced with the loss of habitat, disease, dog attacks and bushfires.

The Australian Koala Foundation estimates there are fewer than 100,000 of the animals left in the wild.