1.2 million died from snake bite in India between 2000-2019: Report

The World Health Organisation has estimated that between 81,000 and 138,000 people die from snake bites globally each year, and of these, nearly half are in India.

Nearly 1.2 million people died from snake bite deaths in India between 2000 and 2019, and many of these fatalities can be avoided by adopting a series of targeted precautions, a new study has pointed out.

A cop holds a snake found inside the Sukhna Lake Cafeteria, in Chandigarh, India, on Sunday, June 21, 2020. The snake was later released in the nearby forest area. (Photo: Keshav Singh/ HT)

Published in the open access journal eLife, the ‘Trends in snakebite deaths in India from 2000 to 2019 in a nationally representative mortality study’, was based on data collected from the Indian Million Death Study, a collaborative effort between the Toronto-based Centre for Global Health Research or CGHR and the Registrar General of India.

The World Health Organisation has estimated that between 81,000 and 138,000 people die from snake bites globally each year, and of these, nearly half are in India. Three times that number survive but may require amputations or suffer permanent disabilities.

CGHR executive director and senior author of the snake bite study, Dr Prabhat Jha, told the Hindustan Times there is “evidence of avoidability here.”

“A set of measures targeted at high-burden states, during the peak period during the monsoon, could result in an appreciable reduction in fatalities. Some of the measures could be simple,” Jha said.

Jha added that as the deaths primarily occur in rural areas at lower elevations, provision of rubber boots, rechargeable torches, and aligning anti-venom availability with need, education about preventative measures including safe harvesting practices during farming, are among the steps required.

The regional hotspots lie in the high-burden states of Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat and Jharkhand.

“The risk of an Indian dying from snakebite before age 70 is about 1 in 250, but notably higher in some areas,” the study said. It recommended innovative outreach to tackle the menace. “Increased use of antivenom would require tactful cooperation with local traditional healers and ayurvedic practitioners to persuade them to refer severely ill patients for treatment with antivenom, and raising awareness of the effectiveness of antivenom,” it said.

The study’s lead author Wilson Suraweera, senior research analyst and Bio-statistician at CGHR, noted, “We wanted to provide the most complete picture of snakebite epidemiology in India to better understand the volume of untimely deaths, case-fatality patterns and important snakebite characteristics, while analysing 20 years of scientific data to drill down to regions on which public health measures should be focused.”

“India has sufficient manufacturing capacity for large snake antivenom production. Better understanding of the distribution of India’s many venomous snake species could help in the development of more appropriate antivenoms.”

Among the species identified in the study are Russell’s viper, four types of cobras, eight varieties of kraits, and saw-scaled viper, among others.