Bees, wasp stings pose greater threat than snake and spider bites!

New Delhi: The venom of snakes, spiders and jellyfish are known to be lethal. Their bites are painful and can subject the victim to a torturous death if not treated properly.

Although insects like wasps and bees also have painful bites, people tend to dismiss them since the pain is more or less momentary.

However, in a surprising Australian research, it was discovered that bee and wasp venom poses a bigger threat to public health than the venom of snakes, jellyfish and spiders.

The analysis of 13 years' data on bites and stings from venomous creatures shows that Australia's towns and cities are a hot-spot for encounters.

Including fatalities, venomous stings and bites resulted in almost 42,000 hospitalizations over the study period.

Spider bites were the second most prevalent cause of hospitalization in the 13-year period, accounting for 30 percent of all admissions, while snake bites were third at 15 percent.

Overall, 64 people were killed by a venomous sting or bite, with more than half of these deaths due to an allergic reaction to an insect bite that caused anaphylactic shock.

Snake bites caused 27 deaths. Importantly, snake bite envenoming caused nearly twice as many deaths per hospital admission than other venomous creatures, making snake bite one of the most important venomous injuries to address.

Bees and wasps killed 27 people, with only one case of a beekeeper and one case of a snake catcher recorded. Tick bites caused three deaths and ant bites another two. Box jellyfish killed three people. There were two deaths from unknown insects. No spider bite fatalities were registered.

Ronelle Welton, a public health expert at the Australian Venom Unit at the University of Melbourne, said she was surprised that there were so many deaths and hospitalizations in the populated coastal areas of Australia.

"More than half of deaths happened at home, and almost two-thirds (64 percent) occurred, not in the isolated areas we might expect, but rather, in major cities and inner-regional areas where healthcare is readily accessible," Welton said in a news release on Tuesday.

Welton said she believes the reason insect bites were so deadly was that people could be complacent in seeking medical attention and anaphylaxis can kill quickly.

Western Australia and South Australia were hot spots for stings and bites, and there were no deaths recorded in Tasmania over the decade. Bites and stings were much more likely to occur between April to October.

The study was published in the Internal Medicine Journal.

(With Agency inputs)