Africa braced for snakebite crisis | Hacker News Reader

Africa braced for snakebite crisis

nature.com

37 pointsnkurz19 comments

My son was bitten by a copperhead snake (a viper) near Washington DC. He received a very large dose of poison into a very small hand, and ran a high risk of losing his arm without proper treatment. He received 14 doses of anti-venom, $70,000 worth, and recovered fully. Two years later, we found out that the company that made the anti-venom for copperheads had ceased production, since it wasn't cost-effective. My wife blogged about it: http://www.crazyus.com/2010/07/19/washington-dc-snakes-once-...

whoa I am glad that ended okay, just wow

Another of the snake-bite trivia we learned is that actually until this recent strain of anti-venom was developed, the anti-venom was often as harmful/risky as the actual snake bite itself. Kyle also vomited several times as a result of the anti-venom.

I live in Great Falls and go to the park all the time. I was on the edge while reading this blog. I am so glad your little one is ok. Sounds like your wife acted calm and did all the right things.

Are you sure that anti-venom didn't get outcompeted? This seems to be the current treatment of choice: http://crofab.com/

Side note: any drug the production of which starts with a step like "milk venom from four species of snakes" is inherently expensive.

> In 2010, the French drug firm Sanofi Pasteur in Lyon ceased production of Fav-Afrique, an antibody serum that reduces the quantity of venom circulating in the blood of a snakebite victim.

Here's the stated reason; http://www.usnews.com/news/business/articles/2015/09/07/doct... :

A spokesman for Sanofi Pasteur said the pharmaceuticals company was driven out of the market by competitors selling cheaper products, and it announced in 2010 it would stop making anti-venom. Those cheaper drugs are often seen as less effective.

"It's very strange that the relevant stakeholders are only realizing this problem five years later," said Alain Bernal, a Sanofi Pasteur spokesman. He said the company has offered to transfer the anti-venom technology to others.

...

WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl said the agency has a staffer working on the snakebite problem but donors have largely been uninterested. He said lack of snakebite treatment was also due to doctors deciding not to use anti-venoms because they were made from the wrong snake.

I was blown away when I first learned snakes killed so many people.

3rd most dangerous animal (Mosquito then human)

http://www.gatesnotes.com/Health/Most-Lethal-Animal-Mosquito...

> We were not even sure if it was a venomous snake at this point. We tried calling 911 and could not get through

I'm surprised this doesn't stick out to more people, but I had the same experience in SF. I called 911, and hung up after what seemed like being on hold for 7 minutes.

That is unbelievable! The UK has the world's oldest emergency telephone service. The service is operated by British Telecom and I think most people have an expectation of the call being answered in mere seconds, every single time.

(Although what however has changed dramatically during the current and past two governments is large increases in response times to an emergency.)

BT connects your emergency call to your nearest control centre, but if that has no lines free it connects to an available line at any other control centre in the UK. The call handler then relays your call manually to the appropriate centre as soon as they can get through.

I hope you weren't bitten by a venomous snake in SF.

It occurs to me that someday next century we'll have "chemical" printers that can synthesize drugs on demand. Maybe the hospitals will get them first for cost and legal reasons but eventually just like 3d printers, there will be a hobbyist element.

As long as you can synthesize illegal drugs, as long as you can synthesize patented drugs, there will be no open consumer market for chemical printers.

Um, you can copy things with 3D printers and even make weapons, they are still legal (so far).

Initially they might have chemical printers in hospital labs/pharmacies for emergency use.

http://www.wired.com/2012/05/3-d-printing-patent-law/

And if you think the pharmaceutical companies won't pursue legal action faster and with more power than a gaming company...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3D_printed_firearms#Effect_on_...

It's illegal to make any firearm that is undetectable by a metal detector, and lawmakers are still working to make 3D printing weapons illegal.

Affordable 3D printers won't be good enough to copy most consumer goods for a while yet. And 3D printed weapons are shit--they're basically useless except for sticking it to the Man. That means that 3D printers have many more "legitimate" uses than illegal ones, so for the most part they are accepted, now; as they grow more capable, that foundation will see them grandfathered in, for the most part.

For a home chemical factory like you're discussing, synthesizing drugs illegally would be by far the most popular use case. I'm sure someone would think of something legit to do with it, but it would be an edge case. They would never be allowed to get a foothold, legally.

"Hey want to come over to my house and print some LSD?"

No we probably won't...drug synthesis requires large amounts of reagents. It wouldn't be practical to keep the variety of reagents around to synthesize any given drug.

Here's an older but more in depth article on snakebite antivenom in Africa: http://www.snakebiteinitiative.org/?page_id=696

I found the numbers of people who die each year from snakebite to be staggering. It's around 125,000 deaths per year, with millions of serious injuries: http://www.snakebiteinitiative.org/?page_id=577

The BBC had an article on snakebites a few days ago. It states

"Snakes get closer to humans and cause more damage and more deaths than any other venomous animal, including spiders, scorpions and jellyfish.

Each year, up to five million people worldwide are estimated to be bitten by snakes. Out of those, around 100,000 die and 400,000 are left disabled or disfigured by their injuries.

But the numbers could be even larger - because many of the worst-affected countries don't keep data on snakebites and research into this problem is scarce."

Article: The amazing science behind fatal snake bites http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-34214029

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