Yesterday,
we had 2 patients turning up with dead snakes after having been bitten by them.
The
difference from all the previous instances of patients turning up with dead
snakes was that in both these instances, the snakes were non-poisonous.
Of course,
it is well known that there are more non-poisonous snakes than poisonous ones.
And
the same is true when a snake bites you . . . the chance of a non-poisonous
snake bite is much more than a poisonous snake bite.
Unfortunately,
people are quite ignorant when it comes to distinguishing between poisonous and
non-poisonous snakes. This is what exactly happened with both our patients who
came yesterday.
The first
one was a young man who was bitten by the snake in the snap. He came to us within one hour
of the snake bite. His friends told him that the snake looked like to be a
cross-breed of a krait and a rat snake. However, we very well know that the rat
snake has a way of mimicking a krait by having such a design in the first half
of it’s body.
 |
| Close up of the head |
The second
snake was mistaken to be a cobra. It was quite surprising that the victim
identified it as a cobra. The snake which is a type of water snake is commonly
seen in our part of the country. In fact, this snake is very commonly seen in
fishermen’s net. And of course, its favourite feed is fish.
Killing
non-poisonous snakes especially in a rural setting can be quite a negative
thing as these snakes keep a tab on pests such as frogs and rats which ruin
agriculture.
I appreciate if someone could correct me if my findings are wrong . . .
