Venomous Bites of Snakes in Australia
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Venomous Bites of Snakes in Australia.
As Australia has many unique and strange inhabitants in the wildlife. This includes about 140 species of venomous snakes living in Australia, more than any other country in the world. Australia is the only large land area where venomous snakes outnumber harmless ones. With these confounding facts, it would prove to be of interest to me in finding more about the toxicology of the venoms and poisons produced by these venomous reptiles.
In Australia there are about 3,000 snake bites per year. Of these snake bites, only 200 to 500 (less than 17%) receive antivenom. As it turns out, on average one or two will prove fatal. Half the deaths are due to bites from the brown snake, the rest mostly from tiger snake, taipan and death adder. Some deaths are sudden, however it is uncommon to die within four hours of a snake bite...