White-nose syndrome (WNS) has killed over 90% of some North American bat species since 2006, causing mass mortality events with significant individual suffering. Understanding and supporting WNS response efforts is a wildlife welfare priority.
White-nose syndrome causes individual bat suffering at enormous scale. The disease's mechanism — disrupting torpor to cause repeated arousal during hibernation — results in slow starvation as fat reserves are depleted before spring insect emergence. Affected bats die over weeks in a condition of progressive energy deficit. The welfare implications of mass bat mortality extend beyond individual animals: bats provide critical ecosystem services (insect control worth billions annually) that affect agricultural productivity and wild plant pollination. Conservation responses that reduce WNS mortality protect both individual bat welfare and the broader ecological wellbeing that bats support.