BITTEN by a snake? A DNA test could help find the antidote.
When a snake bites someone, it leaves some of its DNA along with the venom. Now, that can identify the species of snake; a finding that could take the guesswork out of choosing the right antidote.
鈥淎t present, the standard of practice is no identification at all, a diagnosis from the symptoms, or more rarely identification of dead snakes that victims occasionally bring to the clinic,鈥� says Fran莽ois Chappuis of Geneva University Hospitals in Switzerland, who presented the work this week at the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene annual meeting in New Orleans.
Advertisement
Chappuis and his colleagues collected samples from the fang wounds of 749 people at three health centres in Nepal, amplified the DNA and sequenced it. They then looked for matches in a publicly available reference bank of DNA sequences.
They managed to identify the snake responsible for 194 bites, 87 of which were from species whose venom is harmful to people. Chappuis aims to produce fast bedside tests that detect locally dangerous species.
This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淪lither of DNA finds snakebite antidote鈥�