An estimated 5.4 million people worldwide are bitten by snakes annually, resulting in millions of amputations, other permanent disabilities, and even death. In the tropical and subtropical nations of Africa, Asia, and Latin America, snake bites are a neglected health issue. Venoming most affects agricultural families in poor rural communities, where health care is not readily available—and if it is, it is extremely expensive with sparse medical resources. The increase in innovations regarding the manufacture of anti-venom, specifically in biotechnology, has the potential to help this tropical disease.
Venom:
Bites by venomous snakes initially cause tissue injury with pain, redness, and blistering being observed. In severe cases, it can then manifest into neuromuscular paralysis, acute kidney injury, and cardiovascular collapse, among many others. Medical emergencies involving irreversible kidney failure and severe tissue destruction lead to necessary amputations that cause permanent disability. Children are known to suffer more severe effects and are more likely to pass away from their injuries due to their smaller body mass.
Anti-venom Production and Issues:
Anti-venom is traditionally produced by milking varieties of venomous species. Small doses of this venom are injected into animals like horses, rabbits, sheep, and dogs, as they can naturally produce antibodies to the venom. These antibodies can then be harvested by taking the blood from the animals for it to be fragmented and purified for commercial use. Finally, when injected into an infected patient, the antibodies will bind to the venom and neutralize it. However, there is a significant challenge in the production of antivenom that stems from the lack of adequate information and resources. The manufacture of antivenom is a time-consuming and expensive process, in which the few countries that can produce quality antivenom, are not necessarily the ones with the most demand. This issue is expounded by the poor data on the number of people, types of snake bites, and distribution policies that make it difficult for manufacturers to be able to make a profit from the industry, leading to a lack of supply and therefore demand.
BioTechnology Solutions:
First and foremost, innovations in biotechnology can make anti-venom production easier to produce at a more cost-effective price point. One established method that could be adapted is the use of DNA immunization techniques. Instead of injecting animals with actual venom, scientists would immunize the animals with toxin-encoding DNA to mimic and then produce the antibodies. Another identified method has to do with the replacement of the antibodies with recombinant human versions. This method of producing pharmaceutical products through cell cultivation in fermentation tanks has been developed and perfected in the past thirty years. Both of these innovative methods would result in lower manufacturing costs. Lower manufacturing costs would make it more profitable for pharmaceutical companies to bring lower-costing antivenoms to the market, making it a possible incentive to distribute them to rural tropic areas.
References
Andreas Hougaard Laustsen Postdoctoral Fellow at the Department of Biotechnology and Biomedicine, and Mikael Engmark PhD Student Department of Bio and Health Informatics. “How Biotechnology Could Offer Hope for Snakebite Victims.” The Conversation, 13 Sept. 2022, theconversation.com/how-biotechnology-could-offer-hope-for-snakebite-victims-68244#:~:text=There%20have%20been%20incremental%20innovations,isolating%20antibodies%20from%20the%20serum.
Wagstaff SC;Laing GD;Theakston RD;Papaspyridis C;Harrison RA; “Bioinformatics and Multiepitope DNA Immunization to Design Rational Snake Antivenom.” PLoS Medicine, U.S. National Library of Medicine, pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16737347/. Accessed 10 Mar. 2024.
“What Is Antivenom?” School of Biomedical Sciences, biomedicalsciences.unimelb.edu.au/departments/department-of-biochemistry-and-pharmacology/engage/avru/discover/what-is-antivenom. Accessed 10 Mar. 2024.
Gameiro, Denise Neves. “Can Biotech Make Antivenoms Better and Cheaper with Antibodies?” Labiotech.Eu, 22 June 2022, www.labiotech.eu/trends-news/can-biotechnology-make-antivenoms-better-and-cheaper/.
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