In the animal kingdom, bats are notorious natural reservoirs for infectious disease — and valuable footage captured in Uganda could give researchers new insight into how emerging pathogens are transmitted between species, per The New York Times.

Research published in the peer-reviewed journal Nature in 2021 observed that "bats host more zoonotic pathogens than any other known mammalian species." 

The World Health Organization defines "zoonotic pathogens" (or zoonoses) as diseases that have "jumped from a non-human animal to humans." Medical experts estimate that 60% to 75% of emerging diseases — pathogens that are either entirely novel or illnesses that abruptly strike a population — are zoonotic in nature. 

As was deftly illustrated in the eerily prescient 2011 film Contagion, habitat loss and an overheating planet have drastically exacerbated the rate at which zoonotic pathogens spread by vector species like mosquitoes and bats. 

The nature of emerging diseases and zoonotic transmission is such that researchers are tasked with retracing a novel pathogen's steps, often in the midst of an outbreak.

Trail cameras provide scientists and conservationists with unprecedented opportunities to observe animal behavior from afar, and "solar-powered camera traps" in Uganda's Queen Elizabeth National Park captured invaluable footage of bats interacting with other animals in the wild, according to the Times.

Bosco Atukwatse, whom the Times described as "a young Ugandan wildlife biologist," set up the cameras at a site known as Python Cave. That cave happens to be home to tens of thousands of Egyptian fruit bats.

Atukwatse intended to observe spotted hyenas and leopards but said a combination of "curiosity and luck" revealed a trove of data about how bats interact with large predators and act as a vector for disease.

According to Atukwatse, myriad predators were seen visiting the cave at night to hunt. He said it was "amazing how many animals come to eat bats at that specific spot," adding that the predators would end up "dispersing" pieces of the bats they hunted.

On June 15, Atukwatse published a preprint — an early draft of published research — to share his findings. It is pending peer review.

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Jonathan Epstein is an epidemiologist and expert on zoonotic transmission. Epstein was not involved in publishing the paper, but he told the Times why the data could be extremely valuable for both researching emerging zoonotic pathogens and defining them to the public.

"It's a really important observation, because we think speculatively about how wildlife comes into contact with each other, but we rarely ever observe it. It helps us paint the picture," Epstein said.

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