An Australian hospital is begging snakebite victims to stop bringing snakes to the ER

Once the new shelf-stable oral universal venomous snake bite treatment is commercially available I bet the Aussies are going to stock up on it.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/hospital-...102732107.html

When I was bitten by a snake as a kid, the emergency room doctor was disappointed that I didn't bring the snake with me. I told him it was a garter snake, but he wasn't comfortable relying on the identification of a 10 year old. He didn't treat me though. I suppose his observation that I wasn't writhing in pain was enough to convince him that I wasn't bitten by anything venomous.

A garter snake sent you to the ER? They have some pretty big garters where you live, apparently.... ;)

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Originally Posted by Malum Argenteum

A garter snake sent you to the ER? They have some pretty big garters where you live, apparently.... ;)

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My mom trusted my identification even less than the emergency room doctor.

When I was about that age, I got my first bite from a wild snake (eastern milk snake). I didn't exactly know what kind of snake it was. Anyway, the bite was really minimal but it was such that it looked a little bit like two punctures. I pretty seriously thought I was probably going to die from being envenomated, but I wasn't at all freaking out about it. I was just sitting and thinking about what it might end up being like, and wondering how long it would take.

Kids can be pretty weird; I'm glad I'm done with all that. :)