"In Gorongosa National Park, at the southern tip of Africa’s Great Rift Valley, water breathes with the seasons. Lakes and rivers that overflow during the winter months are reduced to puddles and trickles come summer. For many species—including the Mozambique long-fingered bat (Miniopterus mossambicus)—the dry season means longer journeys for a much-needed sip of water.

As our planet warms and droughts increase in both frequency and intensity, the seasonal oases that bats depend on are drying up. Without adequate water, healthy bats begin to weaken, making them more susceptible to diseases that are already devastating populations around the world. Those that survive are sometimes forced to drink from human-made bodies of water—a boon for bats, but a potential risk for people who drink from those same water sources, since bats carry a host of zoonotic diseases. It’s often at these interspecies interfaces that killers like Ebola and the novel coronavirus emerge."