North American Cobra Snakebite
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Posted by Steve Grenard on December 07, 1997 at 21:58:08:
Within the last 24 hours serious cobra bite envenomation number 8
in North America occurred when Kevin Stotler of Prince William County
Virginia was bitten by one of his 10 "pet" venomous snakes. He is
in serious condition and received 18 vials of cobra antivenom. Case
#7 ocurred in New York City last week when a Florist was bitten by
his "pet" albino monocled cobra in FLushing, Queens, N.Y.
These 8 cases which include two deaths are cases which either made
the news or were personally made known to me. There have probably
been more.
While tens of thousands of people in India and Asia endure cobra bites
annually, this number of cases are more than we have the right to
expect in the U.S. I urge anyone who keeps venomous snakes to
reconsider their position on this matter and, at the very least, to
visit our emergency snakebite website at:
http://www.xmission.com/~gastown/herpmed/snbite.htm
The website advocates Dr Struan Sutherland's method of pressure
dressings to sequester venom. It is extremely effective and has been
in use in Australia for more than a decade. U.S. snakebite experts
believe it should not be used on U.S. snakebites. I hasten to point
out that U.S. snakebites are crotalid bites. Anyone keeping an exotic
elapid or an American elapid (Coral Snakes as well as some crotalids
with neurotoxic venoms) are well advised to become familiar with the
method. A pro/con discussion of why U.S. medical experts decry its
use on crotalid bites appears at the end of the site.
Sadly some keepers of elapids in the U.S. have been misled into
believing that the "method is not approved here" or our doctors say
it should not be used. Our doctors are speaking of crotalid bite only.
If you keep an exotic elapid or any species whose venom is primarily
neurotoxic (Mojaves, Aruba Island Rattlers, some ssps of Cascabel)
then such dressings can save your life. Some of the deaths we have
reviewed from these cobra bite cases ocurred in less than 30 minutes
from time of bite. While it is obviously impossible to say if pressure
dressings could have saved these people (two older cases had severe
anbaphylactic reactions to the venom or so it appeared), it could
be life saving to adopt the method.
Steve Grenard
Venom-Listserv Website:
http://www.icomm.ca/venom
Gateway to HerpMed:
http://www.xmisison.com/~gastown/herpmed/
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