Man wins, at least against the snake. Pit viper bites can be really nasty, and it sounds like Dave got hit by a big one. Rattlesnake venom is hemotoxic, meaning it destroys tissue. This makes a bite from a members of the pit viper family extremely painful, and visibly damaging to the surrounding area. In high enough doses it’s lethal. It looks like reasonably prompt treatment with antivenin managed to save his life. While I think we all can agree getting bitten by a snake is a remarkably bad run of luck, the specific type of snake here, the pit viper, is responsible for enough bites of man and beast each year to create a viable market for antivenin, and overcome the hurdles the FDA throws at people making the stuff.
To understand that, you have to understand a bit about antivenin. What is generally done is to inject snake venom into a horse, which causes the horse to produce antibodies against the venom. Those antibodies can be separated from the horse’s blood, purified, preserved, and eventually injected into the victim of a snake bite. The horse antibodies then go to work neutralizing the venom. It sounds great, and it is. The only problem is, there are a significant number of people who are allergic to equine proteins, and who will go into anaphylactic shock as a result of the treatments, never mind the snake bite.
So clearly if you’re dying of a snakebite, we can’t take the risk that you might be allergic to the antivenin. Better that you die of the snake bite, lest anyone blame an FDA bureaucrat for approving it. Fortunately for Dave, the FDA has approved an antivenin for pit viper bites that’s sourced from sheep, rather than horses, which fewer people are allergic to. Enough people and animals get bitten by pit vipers each year to make it economical. But what if you get bit by something else?
Something else, like a Coral Snake. Coral Snake have a venom is a neurotoxic, meaning it attacks the nervous system. The victim of a Coral Snake bite might not feel much in the way of pain, not have limbs bloody and blow up like balloons. In that sense, a bite from the Coral Snake is not as dramatic as bites from species that produce hemotoxic venom. But the victim does stand a very good chance, untreated, of dropping dead a few hours later from respiratory and cardiac arrest, as the venom goes to work on the central nervous system. If you happen to be unlucky enough to get bitten by a Coral Snake, which fortunately are rare, since they are not an aggressive species, you’re pretty much shit out of luck. Why? Well, the last US stocks of existing equine derived Coral Snake antivenin are scheduled to expire, right about now actually. The market for antivenin for that species is too small for there to be an incentive for a pharmaceutical maker to get it approved by the FDA. There are stocks in other countries, like Mexico, but they aren’t of a variety that is approved by the FDA, and no one wants to pay for the studies to prove it’s safe. Like I said, better to let you die of the snake bite.
So there you have it. If you get bit by a snake, make sure it’s from a species our government protectors have deemed we may be saved from, or get bit in Mexico. This chapter in government regulation was brought to you by the letter “H” and “C.”