A new study estimates that snakes kill nearly 9,000 people a year in rural Mozambique, a number that could be even higher as most people seek traditional treatment without any registration.
The number of deaths from poisoning reveals that “one in eight snake bites is fatal” in Mozambique, according to the study published by Toxicon, a scientific journal of toxinology, the science that studies toxins produced by microorganisms, plants and animals.
“The incidence of snakebites in rural areas of sub-Saharan Africa may be greatly underestimated,” is the title of the research published at the end of September.
The work was carried out in partnership by several institutions, including the Universidade Lúrio de Moçambique, and aims to contribute to the goal of reducing the incidence of bites by 50% by 2030, as proposed by the World Health Organization (WHO). .
The authors base the new estimates on the results of interviews with 1,037 households in nine communities in the province of Cabo Delgado.
“Although this is an understatement, snakebite incidence levels are ten times higher” than estimates used so far “and the number of deaths is up 30-fold.”
“Further population surveys are urgently needed to assess the full extent of bites in sub-Saharan Africa, explore regional patterns, and develop mitigation plans,” the study abstract reads.
The data indicates that, each year, some 69,200 people are bitten by snakes in Mozambique, a country that is home to at least 14 species of “medical importance”, that is, snakes whose bites “can kill or cause the amputation of limbs”. “.
The majority of the Mozambican population (68%) lives in rural areas and practices agriculture to earn a living, which ends up “exposing millions of people to snake bites”, especially in the rainy season, according to the document.
The high number of medically important snakes and the percentage of the population in rural areas “grant Mozambique high priority status for demographic studies of venomous snakes and the incidence of their bites,” the study concludes.
Source: TSF
