A recent spate of snakebite deaths in Kerala, including those of two young children, along with an increase in snake sightings, has triggered concern across the state. Despite the government having issued fresh instructions and a special action plan to ensure that adequate treatment is available for snakebite victims, worry still persists.
While high summer temperatures are believed to be driving more snakes to seek refuge indoors, increasing human-snake conflict, much of the panic is fuelled by the media and social media influencers, said Jose Louies, CEO of the Wildlife Trust of India.
Jose, who also conceptualised the popular Snake Awareness, Rescue and Protection App (SARPA), an entirely volunteer-driven snake rescue effort now overseen by the state Forest Department, said that Kerala is possibly the state which is best prepared to deal with snakebite. He urged people to stay calm.
Edited excerpts from an interview:
Over the last few years, snakebite deaths in Kerala have been dipping, with 34 deaths in 2024-25 reduced to 18 the next year. But this April, there were six deaths reported in as many days. What changed?
In Kerala, there have been snakebite incidents earlier and people were treated, most survived and some, unfortunately, have died. This is not something that’s never happened. What’s different this time is the heat. Temperature plays a major role here because you have to understand that snakes are cold-blooded animals that prefer darker, cooler places. I’ve been dealing with snakes for 20-25 years – I can tell you that when the surrounding temperatures are high, snakes search for places to hide. Houses became the best place for them. They started to stay indoors for longer and human-snake interactions started increasing. That’s what happened in almost all the recent cases of deaths.
So the only differentiator this year is heat?
Heat is the only unusual thing – but we really don’t yet know how it impacted the snakes. Maybe it had changed their lifecycle. Usually, hatchlings come just before the rains because monsoon is when they get a lot of food. But it may be due to the warmer temperatures, they’ve started laying eggs a little earlier.
Is Kerala prepared to deal with snakebite incidents?
I work across the country, I’ve seen the response mechanisms, the infrastructure, the ability and empathy of doctors. I would say Kerala is the state which is best prepared to deal with snakebite. The Forest Department is ready to deal with live animals and the Health Department is ready to deal with patients.
If at all you feel you’ve been bitten by a snake – and you don’t need to see the snake or the classic two fang mark with blood which is imprinted in our imagination – go to the hospital. The longer you delay, the riskier it is. And in Kerala, there is no antivenom shortage. Clinically, if you reach a hospital on time, snakebite victims can be saved. But if you panic, your chances of survival reduce significantly. In Kerala, the biggest problem is the fear factor that has been created.
Why is there so much fear?
People are panicking and it’s not just the natural spike in sightings because of the rise in temperature. They are sending us photographs of their backyard saying we saw a snake there. It is unnecessary panic. Snakebite is a medical emergency which can be successfully treated in Kerala. We have proven that it can be managed.
You should be panicking if there is no antivenom, treatment methods or if the average hospital distance is 100 km away and there’s no infrastructure to reach it. But here, we have almost all the necessary infrastructure in place and among the best doctors available throughout the state. Taluk-level hospitals also have antivenom and good doctors. So there’s no need to panic.
As primates, we human beings have an imprinted fear of snakes. That fear is now being amplified by TV channels and social media influencers. This sensationalising of snakebite is creating panic and works absolutely against the first principle of snakebite treatment, which is to not panic.
I can guarantee that after May 4 (when poll results are announced) there will be no snakebite news in Kerala. Added to this is the problem of misidentification. For instance, the wolf snake, which is non-venomous and very common, looks like a krait – and 99.9% of people can’t tell the difference. So that also creates panic.
Over the last five years, the number of snakebite deaths were gradually coming down in Kerala. I’ll never say that there will be zero deaths because this is an accident that can happen anytime, in the middle of cities, in villages, and wherever there are snakes. But on social media, there’s now a school of thought saying why rescue snakes, we need to denotify them from the (Wildlife Protection) Act and kill them. Killing snakes is not a solution. Even if we find and kill every single venomous snake in Kerala, they will come from other regions.
Snakes play an important role in our ecology. What we need to try and ensure is that your home does not become a suitable habitat for snakes. Avoid clutter, for instance. If you are sleeping on the floor, use a mosquito net.
What does the data on the SARPA app show, about incidents over the years?
When we launched, the number of rescues were fewer. It increased over the years, as people began using the app to call rescuers, instead of killing the snakes.
We’ve done over 79,000 snake rescues over the last five years through SARPA, of which about 30,000 are cobras. That’s a big number. But just by looking at that data, I’d never say the snake population has increased. It’s the response mechanism that has increased. We’ve also seen that people have started understanding that they don’t need to call us if they see a rat snake, which is non-venomous. Now, that has changed but the current situation has also shown us there can be challenges like this.
With summers likely to get warmer in coming years, do people need to prepare for more human-snake conflict, including in other states?
We don’t know that yet. It may be that a lot of snakes in the open may also die – a cobra exposed to the sun for a long time will die. Climate change is a factor. But we really don’t know how it will play out. Currently, we have a challenge which is that snakes are sharing their habitat with humans. In most cases, it is a non-venomous snake. With venomous snakes, we have to ensure the snake is removed and that it does not enter houses. But there will be snakes in your surroundings.
People also have to understand that snakes are not out to kill them, which is how it’s now being portrayed. It’s not as if snakes are waking up in the morning with the idea that they will kill 10 humans that day. Road accidents kill many more people, but why are we not panicking about those? What we’re seeing is hype fuelled by the media.
Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Karnataka have better infrastructure when it comes to dealing with snakebites. Recently, in UP there was an incident where a boy who was bitten by a snake was kept in the river Ganga for hours for a ritual, instead of being taken to the hospital. He died. Kerala has better awareness, infrastructure and probably the best response mechanism. With all this, there is no need to panic.
If someone does get bitten by a snake, what should one do immediately?
The first and most important rule is to not panic. Immobilise the bitten area. Don’t wash the wound, don’t cut it open, or do anything of that sort. Use whatever vehicle is available, get them to the nearest hospital. You can use the SARPA app for that, it will direct you to the nearest hospital. Tell the doctor it’s a suspected snakebite – everything else will be taken care of.
I would also request people, humbly, not to download the SARPA app for the sake of it because over the last seven days, our servers are not able to keep up with the demand. Usually there would be 3,000 users in a day but in the last 24 hours, there were 90,000 users. SARPA is an entirely volunteer-driven effort and we are trying to manage it but with all the conversation, everyone wants to download it – and it’s not that we get paid per download. Like with panic hoarding, there’s no need to panic download.
Indulekha Aravind is an independent journalist based in Bengaluru.