Reptile & Amphibian Forums

hi

i like to have a discussion about which snakes that causes
most human deaths around the world...the top 15-20 or the snakes that kills over 50 to 100 hundred persons/year...

And the exact latin species too!

to start i can present my top 10 list about how i would
guess if i get the question!

1. Daboia russellii russellii
2. Naja naja
3. Echis carinatus carinatus
4. Naja kaouthia
5. Bungarus caeruleus
6. Bothrops moojeni
6. Bothrops atrox
6. Ophiophagus hannah
6. Bitis arietans arietans
6. crotalus durissus terrificus

some intersting facts is that 30-40.000 humans dies every
year from snakebites.
- 5.000? in south america
-25.000? in asia
- 5.000? i africa

so...more bitis, naja, bungarus must be in the list...what do you think?

>>year from snakebites.
>>- 5.000? in south america
>>-25.000? in asia
>>- 5.000? i africa

More recent estimates for deaths are:

Asia: 100,000
Africa: 20,000
Latin America: 5000

This means that Asian species will account for more deaths than the others. Major causes of death in Asia are Daboia russelii, Bungarus spp., Naja spp., and also Echis carinatus and, to a lesser extent, Calloselasma rhodostoma, so these will top the list globally.

Cheers,

Wolfgang
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This means that Asian species will account for more deaths than the others.

Would it be unreasonable to state that the higher account of deaths in asia is due more from the crowded population that results in more people coming into closer contact with venomous snakes in general rather than any particular species? Africa falling second and then of course central/south america. Also I think that the quality of the medical facilities or the lack of some in many regional areas also help contribute to the death accounts.

Two other mitigating factors are lack of decent footwear as well as housing that is not snake-proof. This is true in all three areas.

~~Greg~~

>>This means that Asian species will account for more deaths than the others.
>>
>>
>>Would it be unreasonable to state that the higher account of deaths in asia is due more from the crowded population that results in more people coming into closer contact with venomous snakes in general rather than any particular species? Africa falling second and then of course central/south america. Also I think that the quality of the medical facilities or the lack of some in many regional areas also help contribute to the death accounts.

Absolutely. Large number of deaths are the product of large numbers of bites (which in turn result from the interaction of snake and human biology, including the numbers of both), and their outcome (influenced by snake lethality and medical care).

Africa is particularly poorly supplied from a medical treatment point of view (very poor antivenom availability in most countries), whereas the situation in Asia is more patchy - some countries have good medical facilities and low lethality rates (e.g., Thailand, Malaysia), in others the situation is pretty bad.

The much lower death rates in Latin America are due to the fact that medical (and especially antivenom supplies) in most countries are actually not that bad.

Note also that the snakes that cause the most deaths are not necessarily those that are the worst in terms of risk of death to the person bitten. Taipans, mambas, king cobras etc. are far more likely to kill you than Daboia russelii or Naja naja, but bites are much rarer, so few people die of them. By contrast, in much of SE Asia, Calloselasma rhodostoma is a major cause of lethality, even though the case fatality rate is low - it is simply a very common snake in populated areas and especially plantations.

Cheers,

Wolfgang
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i dont think its 125.000 deaths/year...

30-40.000 is the most used numbers of snake bite fatals!

but back to basic question...

which more arts?

>>i dont think its 125.000 deaths/year...
>>
>>30-40.000 is the most used numbers of snake bite fatals!

That's a very outdated figure from the 1950s, which has been shown to be a gross underestimate again and again (primarily because it was based on hospital records - in the tropical world, many people go to local healers rather than hospitals). Figures of the order of 100,000 have been widely accepted for quite a few years. The figure of 125,000 comes from:

Chippaux, J.-P. (1998) Snake-bites: appraisal of the global situation. Bull. World Hlth.Org. 76:515-524.

Cheers,

Wolfgang
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I dont know if this has been mentioned as i dont know the latin names yet for this snake but what about Sea snakes i think in particular is the beaked sea snake that is one of the most venomous snakes in the world and one of Mark o'shea's friends died because he mistook the beaked sea snake for a non venomous snake so surely that would cause a lot of deaths aswell if u couldent get medical attention. Also Mark o'Shea was bitten in 1993 by a timber rattlesnake he was in intensive care for a week and he went blind for a short time so im sure that must be a killer if u cant get to a hospital in time. Sorry for the long message and thanks to u guys im learing a lot more about snakes.

It is doubtful that any significant quantity of people are killed by sea snakes. Their habitat & demeanor pretty much rule that out. If encoutered underwater, they are not particularly defensive unless approached way too closely.

Crotalus horridus does have an extremely dangerous bite, though not as bad as some other North American species, and the bottom line is that in the U.S., there are annually a dozen ..more or less..fatalities from snakebite. This is probably due to people living in homes that are generally not entered by snakes, the wearing of decent footwear, & the availability of decent medical facilities.

~~Greg~~
Florida's Venomous Snakes

Yes, beaked sea snakes are terribly venomous, but very few people (usually only fisherman when they get trapped in their nets) get bitten by them...the snake O'Shea's friend died from (if we're thinking of the same person) was a krait of some kind, forget what species...he mistook it for a harmless mimic. Considering that all seasnakes are venomous, it would be incredibly hard to believe that any herpetologist could mis-identify a beaked sea snake as non-venomous...

Thanks psilocybe yeah we're talking about the same person. How long would u have if a Beaked Sea snake bites you would u have time to get some medical attention?.

>>Thanks psilocybe yeah we're talking about the same person. How long would u have if a Beaked Sea snake bites you would u have time to get some medical attention?.

Usually quite a few hours. Enhydrina venom is primarily myotoxic in humans (i.e., it breaks down skeletal muscle), and it usually takes a number of hours to get you into serious trouble.

Don't confuse deadliness and speed of action - some extremely deadly snakes can take quite a long time to kill you, simply because of the mode of action of the venom. Obviously, you have more time to get help if you are bitten by a snake with a slow-acting venom.

Cheers,

Wolfgang
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ok it was a very big number...125.000....sounds like catastroichal high number...

i presume that we have to search in the big countrys then
like china, pakistan, india, indonesia, philippines, new guinea, burma, laos, kampuchea, vietnam for common snakes maybe over 1 meter to find the snakes that causes most death bites?...

malaysia and thailand have a good antivenomsituation?

Some of the countrys that have highest snake mortability:
myanmar, 7.000
sri lanka, 1.000
nigeria, 10.000
india, 35.000-54.000
brasil
pakistan, 20.000
nepal, 1000
westafrica, 23.000
vietnam, 7.000

i come back!