How white-nose syndrome is devastating North American bat populations and what conservation responses protect both populations and individuals.
White-nose syndrome creates individual and population-level welfare harm simultaneously. Individually, an affected bat experiences repeated disruptions to hibernation — waking when it should be dormant, burning through its fat reserves in futile attempts to find food in a winter environment without insects. The progressive deterioration from repeated arousal to emaciation to death may extend over weeks. At population scale, the elimination of species that provide insect pest control services affects agricultural and ecosystem health in ways that cascade to affect other species. Conservation responses that prevent further spread and support population recovery are simultaneously welfare interventions — protecting individual bats from a prolonged, painful death.