Common Blood-thinning Drug Neutralises Cobra Venom

[NamStay]

Cobra venom neutralised by common blood-thinning drug Heparin

Heparin can neutralise the necrosis-causing toxins in some spitting cobras' venom, scientists discover.

www.bbc.com

A drug commonly prescribed to thin blood can be repurposed as a cheap antidote to cobra venom, a team of scientists based in Australia, Canada, Costa Rica and the UK has discovered.

Snakebites kill about 138,000 people a year, mostly in poorer rural areas in low- and middle-income countries in Africa, South and South East Asia.

More than 400,000 others develop necrosis when the tissue around the bite dies and turns black.

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[glblanchard]

Very interesting!

 

[sgt_zim]

Heparin carries its own set of risks.

Heparin can't be self-administered - it's generally given by IV. The article doesn't say, but I imagine it's talking about Lovenox (generic enoxaprin), which is administered via subcutaneous injection. Too much heparin too fast could cause hemorrhaging.

They're both relatively cheap, at least when compared to common antivenins. The common one in the US, administered for rattler and cottonmouth envenomations, is Crofab - it runs 6K - 10k USD per dose.

 

[Firebird]

An interesting podcast concerning snakes anti venom etc. is the “IheartAfricaProject” podcast with guest participant Donald Schultz

 

[flatwater bill]

Although not mentioned in the article, I have often wondered what effects various snake bites had on people taking Warfarin. Many hunters traveling to Africa have had some need for anti-coagulation, as they are the age group most at risk. In the old days, that anticoagulant was rat poison. Very interesting topic.......................FWB

 

[Jäger_Ivo]

Interesting, but quite complicated. Full text of the original scientific article - https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/scitranslmed.adk4802

 

[sgt_zim]

Interesting, but quite complicated. Full text of the original scientific article - https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/scitranslmed.adk4802

The article doesn't mention enoxaparin (Lovenox), but it is a low molecular weight heparin similar to deltaparin and tanziparin. And it looks like the research was aimed specifically at red- and black-necked spitting cobra venom.

I figured it had to be something like that.

Heparin itself is only ordered when a patient has a large, patent clot; has to be administered via IV; and blood is drawn from the patient every 6 or 8 hours (@Just Gina probably knows better than I, it has been a long while since I was a nurse) to determine if the patient has a therapeutic level of it in their blood stream. The heparin IV is given continuously (usually over several days) until the clot is resolved, then the patient is transitioned over to a less aggressive, oral anticoagulant to hopefully prevent the formation of new clots. In the old days, that would have been warfarin.

All patients getting heparin treatment are placed on what we call "Fall Precaution" - not because they're more likely to fall, but if they do fall, even if skin isn't broken, they're going to have a significant bleeding event.