Preclinical antivenom-efficacy testing reveals potentially disturbing deficiencies of snakebite treatment capability in East Africa.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Antivenom is the treatment of choice for snakebite, which annually kills an estimated 32,000 people in sub-Saharan Africa and leaves approximately 100,000 survivors with permanent physical disabilities that exert a considerable socioeconomic burden. Over the past two decades, the high costs of the most polyspecifically-effective antivenoms have sequentially reduced demand, commercial manufacturing incentives and production volumes that have combined to create a continent-wide vacuum of effective snakebite therapy. This was quickly filled with new, less expensive antivenoms, many of which are of untested efficacy. Some of these successfully marketed antivenoms for Africa are inappropriately manufactured with venoms from non-African snakes and are dangerously ineffective.

SUBMITTER: Harrison RA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5646754 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature