#envenomation

[piplupfluffwritingstuff2]

Whumptober 2024 No. 28 Altprompt- Venom

I had to do so much research for this snippet guys, I really hope you like it!

“And this, my dear Hero, is where I keep my babies,” Villain said, opening a large metal door.

Hero followed them outside, astounded to see what looked like a mix between a zoo and a wildlife center. All kinds of exotic animals prowled about in enormous enclosures.

“Is this what you spent that stolen bank money on?” Hero asked in awe.

“Maybe~” Villain sang.

Villain strolled up to a tiger and petted it, the tiger purred loudly.

“Who’s a good boy, you are!” Villain cooed.

Hero kept their distance; they didn’t want to be tiger meat. Villain beckoned them over.

"He won’t bite,” Villain promised, “unless you’re a raw steak of course.”

Hero gulped, coming over. The tiger sniffed Hero’s hand, then pressed its head into it, purring. Hero stared slack-jawed as they stroked its fur.

“Aw, he likes you!” Villain smiled.

Villain showed Hero a number of other animals, all of which were rescued in some way or another and unfit to return to the wild. A scarlet macaw, a European badger, a very tiny species of deer. Suddenly, Villain’s face fell.

“Oh no,” they said, “not again.”

“What’s wrong?”

“My platypus,” Villain said, “he’s run off again.”

“Maybe he had to fight Dr. Doofenshmirtz,” Hero joked.

“Oh, this is no laughing matter, you have no idea what Percy is capable of.”

“What do you mean- AUGH!”

Something pinched their ankle, and Hero dropped to the ground, clutching it for dear life as electrifying pain exploded through it.

“Hero!” Villain shouted.

Villain bent down and picked up the offending animal; it was none other than Percy the platypus.

“No sir!” Villain scolded, putting Percy back in his home, “we do not sting people!”

“That thing is venomous!?” Hero screeched through the pain.

“Well, yes,” Villain said between Hero’s screams, “stay there, I have what you need.”

Villain ran to a cabinet near Percy’s enclosure. They pulled out a vial labeled “nerve-blocker” and a syringe. Filling it, they ran back to Hero’s side.

“Shh, I know, I know,” Villain soothed, “it’ll be over soon, I promise.”

Villain pulled up Hero’s pant leg and examined the wound. Their ankle was already quite swollen. Villain injected the contents of the syringe right into the envenomation site. After a few minutes, Hero’s screams died down to little whimpers.

“Why,” they panted, “do you have… that… in your collection!?”

“Percy can’t swim,” Villain said, “he wouldn’t make it very long in nature. I’ve gotten my fair share of stings from him. I’m just sorry you had to experience it. He is a bit skittish around visitors.”

Hero went to stand, but Villain stopped them.

“You won’t be able to walk for a few weeks,” Villain said, “I need to have you on nerve-blockers around the clock.”

“WHAT!?”

“Your symptoms won't subside until then, and you might still have trouble for a few months after that. Fortunately, I am delveoping an antivenom. I’ve been studying Percy’s venom and I think I almost have it down.”

“Wait… there’s no antivenom!?”

“No, but there will be as soon as I finish it,” Villain smiled awkwardly.

Hero couldn’t even feel their ankle now, which was far better than the last minute and a half, but that meant no heroics or anything at all really for some time.

“I’ll take care of you, Hero,” Villain said, seeming to read their thoughts.

Villain picked Hero up in a bridal carry and took them from the site, back inside their lair. They brought them up to a guest room and laid them down in a bed.

“I’ll get all the medical equipment hooked up to you,” Villain said, “and then we’ll talk about the recovery plan, okay?”

Hero nodded, their adrenaline wearing off and giving way to shock. In all of their fights, they had never felt pain like that. Percy was suddenly far more terrifying than any supervillain.

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[tanuki-pyon]

Another piece for @the-black-mage-of-phantasm and their fic Envenomation !

"...Sucy’s hand went to her skirt, intent on pulling out some of her potions to try and see which one was best to get her out of here, but she paused. On the way to one of her pockets, her fingers hadn’t brushed up against anything there.

Where was her pouch?

Sucy’s frown deepened. She looked around at the ground, but it was still too dark to see anything, even for her. She reached for a pocket in her jacket, and pulled out a vial full of blue liquid. She shook the vial a few times, and it started to glow a light blue. With one last shake, she undid the cork, and from the vial, the liquid popped out like a small set of fireworks, rapidly swirling in the air and taking the shape of several small, blue orbs that floated around her. One of the orbs went to her waiting hand, and floated right above it, an almost unearthly warmth filling her palm. Sucy used that as her new, pseudo-flashlight, using it to light some of her surroundings. With the help of the other orbs, the grove was filled with a little bit more light than the amount her wand could produce. But they wouldn’t last long, so she had to be quick and—

Sucy took in her surroundings. Really took them in.

This part of the forest looked…off, from the rest. It wasn’t like the restored, storybook fantasy world Arcturus had become. It looked more like it did before magic had been brought back. Mostly.

Because even back then, no part of Arcturus looked this dead. The ground itself looked like it was made of ash, more like chalky gravel than it was dirt. What little patches of grass she could see were a decaying, broken shade of grey, and she could make out bits of the grass crumbling from the silent breeze. The few trees that were here all just looked withered and lifeless; there were faces on them, like most of the trees in Arcturus, but the ones she saw were broken, like something had burst from within the bark and shattered them. But from what she could make out of the remnants of those faces, it kind of looked like they had been screaming.

And then there was one tree that caught her eye the most, one not that far away from her, and somehow, looked even more unnaturally placed than anything else she’d seen. It was arguably the most “alive” one—and she used that word very loosely. It’s bark was as black as a starless sky, gnarled branches extending like claws from withering, sickly thin limbs. What caught Sucy’s eye the most, was that on its trunk, more of its almost burnt bark extended, taking shape into something that almost looked like a body; a witch’s body, even, going by the broken, tree-bark looking hat on its head. The “witch” was connected to the tree with pitch-black wood that almost looked like stings, her head tilted down, and hat covering whatever face the she had on.

And right in front of that tree, with some of the many potion ingredients she gathered spilled out in front of it, was her pouch..."

[kuramirocket]

How Mexico revolutionized the science of antivenom

Innovative policies and a diverse scorpion population have led to new treatments in Mexico, providing a model for other developing countries, experts say.

PUEBLA STATE, MEXICO - Ojo de Agua Ranch, at the edge of the sleepy town of Agua Fria, is home to nine dogs, six geese, 12 canaries, 21 sheep, and 163 horses. The sprawling 400-acre oasis is the inheritance of five brothers, the eldest of which, Alejandro Alagón, bought the equines in 2008 with a specific purpose in mind: Creating antivenom.

Nearly 140,000 people die from snakebites annually, many of which are treatable with antivenoms, according to the World Health Organization. Envenomations—the term for bites and stings caused by animals such as snakes and scorpions—are also a silent scourge: In 2017, WHO added snakebite envenomations to its list of neglected tropical diseases.

That’s why, throughout the 20th century, Mexican researchers improved and invented over a dozen antivenoms now used in the U.S. and elsewhere. Today, Mexican antivenoms are marketed through the country’s three biggest antivenom firms, Instituto Bioclon, BIRMEX, and Inosan Biopharma, which supplies the U.S. military.

Alagón, who has worked extensively with Bioclon and Inosan, has invented or improved upon 16 antivenom products, two of which have been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

A snake's venom gland is located behind the eye. To milk the reptile, scientists force it to bite down on a hard object, releasing the venom into a receptacle.

"My research comes second only to my family. The fact is that, with antivenoms, lives are saved and suffering is diminished,” Alagón says.

Alagón, seen at his university's spider terrarium, has been stung by a bark scorpion twice—and was saved by his own antivenom.

The country’s inroads in drastically reducing envenomation deaths while building a world-leading antivenom industry offers lessons for other countries with high rates of snakebites and stings.

One of the top places for antivenom research in Mexico is the Institute of Biotechnology at the National Autonomous University.

Their herpetarium boasts 61 endemic and foreign serpientes: among them the Nayarit coral snake, the Yucatán hognosed pitviper, and the Mexican green rattler. A smaller room contains scorpions living in boxes.

A scorpion sting is what transformed the Mexican antivenom industry into one of the world’s most prodigious. After the son of then-President Ernesto Zedillo suffered a near-fatal scorpion sting in 1995, the traumatized politician mobilized the medical establishment. Nurses and doctors were trained in administering antivenom. Production was subsidized by the federal government. Rural communities were educated in treatment options. Zedillo’s efforts paid off. From 1990 to 2007, snakebite mortality decreased by 66 percent, and scorpion mortality decreased by 83 percent, according to a 2020 study led by Alagón.

The sun rises over a paddock at the Ojo de Agua ranch, founded by Alagón’s maternal grandfather

Gravity separates the plasma, the antibody-rich part of blood, which collects at the bottom of the bag in a maroon stripe.

Scientists believe that increasing human migration, coupled with environmental and climatic changes, is bringing more people into contact with venomous creatures.

The term “vicious cycle” is used to describe the socioeconomic process by which developing countries become trapped in a state of high envenomation and low antivenom accessibility.

Mexico broke that cycle by marshaling several public and private resources in what some call a “big blitz”: ample funding for antivenom research and manufacturing, nationwide education programs, investment in modern technologies, and skilled scientists.

Mexican companies also remain competitive by keeping up to date on foreign regulatory requirements, a sticking point for many developing countries, and tend to improve their medications based on feedback about their products’ efficacy

Though challenging, that’s the model that would be beautiful to reproduce elsewhere.

[draconym]

Is Galaga venomous? She's very cute :)

Thank you! She is cute! And technically, she is venomous–though a few reptile enthusiasts like to debate the semantics of this when it comes to snakes like hognoses and garters, because the venom-producing glands of colubrid snakes are smaller and their toxins less potent than snakes with “true” venom glands.

Anyway, the answer is yes, they’re venomous, even if their venom isn’t dangerous to humans. The venom is intended to subdue toads and other small prey, and is more of an annoyance to a large animal like us. Hognoses (unlike garters, in my experience) are also very disinclined to bite, generally preferring to play dead instead:

If they do bite, it takes some chewing for those tiny little teeth in the rear of their mouth to get any of that weak venom in there. Folks who have let a hognose go to town on their appendages mostly report localized swelling, numbness, and discomfort, akin to a bee sting or mosquito bite.

I generally don’t worry about getting bitten by hognoses, though. They’re all bark.

[vgmremixtape]

Visit Original Link

OCR03816: Mega Man 3: Envenomation - YoshiBlade

[Snake Man]

from OverClocked ReMix, and YoshiBlade’s album Candy Corn III: Direct to Video

[drferox]

How often do you see/treat snakebite victims? I live in AZ, and snake bites, while not especially common, aren't exactly an unknown factor here. There's also a vaccine for rattlesnake bites... but it's also super expensive, and from I've heard it doesn't really work well enough to justify using it for my own dogs. Thoughts?

Mate, our snakes are an entirely different kettle of fish. For one, we don’t have rattlesnakes, and I really couldn’t comment with authority on how their venom works, but I understand it’s haemotoxic and causes necrosis.

(This fellow was at the Rattlesnake Museum in New Mexico when we visited last year)

Australian venomous snakes, on the other hand, are quite different. White rattlesnakes belong to the viper group, our venomous snakes are elapids.

(Taipan by XLerate at Wikipedia)

The venom of our snakes, depending on which species did the biting, contain neurotoxins (affect nerves), myotoxins (affect muscle), pro-coagulants (make blood clot), anti-coagulants (make blood not clot), nephrotoxins (affect kidney) and cytotoxins (affect cells in general). They do a whole mess of things.

(If you go to wikipedia, Australia had 5/10 of the most venomous snakes in the world, and 4 of the others are sea snakes)

Now, I deliberately don’t work anywhere near the inland taipan, but I did work in Tasmania and venomous snakes on smaller islands are typically bigger and have more potent venom than mainland counterparts. Tiger snakes were our biggest problem, and Tasmanian Tiger Snake bites required 2x the antivenom of mainland bites, and bites from snakes on the small islands off the coast of Tasmania would require 4x to 6x. At $500, at cost, per vial of antivenom, these were expensive to treat.

Tiger snake bite symptoms typically go a bit like this

Acute signs: Vomiting, salivation, fast breathing, collapse. Pets may initially seem to recover from this though, but its only going to get worse from here.

Paralytic signs: a little while later (under 2 hours) we might see paralysis, altered breathing, bleeding from bite, kidney failure, destruction of red blood cells and destruction or muscle cells.

Cats seem to be partially resistant to the venom, either by being more agile and getting bitten less, or just dying before they make it home and get to be presented to a vet clinic. Once actually treated though, they seem to recover a bit better than dogs, possibly because they cope with the rhabdomyolysis better.

All of this happens over hours, so it’s not enough time for the immune system to generate a response. I doubt we’d ever have a vaccine for Australian snake bites, but our combined tiger-brown antivenoms will treat venom from anything other than death adders.

I don’t see snake bites very commonly now in suburbia, but I suspect that’s because we have more brown snakes and less tiger snakes here. We have some very big brown snakes in the parks and golf courses around here, but they prefer to run away than to bite.