Anna Good
A quick-thinking eight-year-old boy in India retaliated against a venomous cobra after it bit him in the hand and wrapped itself around the wound. According to the New Indian Express, the child, Deepak, was playing in his home’s backyard in India’s Pandarpadh village in Jashpur district when the cobra attacked him and wouldn’t let go.
Deepak told local media, “The snake got wrapped around my hand and bit me. I was in great pain. As the reptile didn’t budge when I tried to shake it off, I bit it hard twice. It all happened in a flash.”
He was rushed to the closest health center by his family, and they discovered that he had gotten very, very lucky.
“He was quickly administered anti-snake venom and kept under observation for the entire day and discharged,” said Dr. Jems Minj.
“Deepak didn’t show any symptoms and recovered fast owing to the dry bite when the poisonous snake strikes but no venom is released,” Qaiser Hussain, a snake expert, explained.
“Such snakebites are painful and may show only local symptoms around the area of bite.”
A senior journalist, Ramesh Sharma, added, “I have never come across such an incident in Jashpur district.”
Jashpur is a highly forested and mountainous district and has the nickname “Naglok,” which means “abode of serpents” due to having over 200 species of snakes, according to Sharma.
This snake-biting incident comes just two short months after a two-year-old girl in Turkey had much the same experience after it bit her on the lip while she played with it.
According to Newsweek, the toddler’s father, Mehmet Ercan, said, “Our neighbors have told me that the snake was in the hand of my child, she was playing with it and then it bit her. Then she has bitten the snake back as a reaction.”
While the kind of snake that bit her is unknown, the little girl, fortunately, survived the bite attack.