World's Deadliest Venom [Killer Snakes Documentary] | Real Wild

it's one of nature's most efficient ways to kill once injected into the bloodstream it can damage nerves and flesh in minutes and trigger searing pain in seconds this is venom a virulent biological toxin and the weapon of choice for thousands of species but which one is most deadly to man of those creatures armed with this lethal cocktail which is more likely to kill you [Music] among the world's venomous creatures there are those whose reputations are infamous but there are many less well-known killers out there everything from mollusks to fish may be armed with onboard biological weapons that are a hundred percent natural and in many cases deadly but when it comes to human beings has always been a great deal of debate as to which of these creatures presents the greatest threat it has inspired one man to come up with a pioneering new system for ranking the world's most dangerous Venom's dr. Jamie Seymour is a venom biologist at James Cook University in Queensland Australia we want to take the terrestrial snakes we want to take the marine snakes we want to take the marine animals we want to take the whole lot bring them all together and test that venom drop the drop and then we want to put in things like how aggressive the animals are and what their population distribution is this ranking system allows Jamie Seymour to understand the different threats posed by venomous creatures and ultimately to identify measures for minimizing the risks it consists of five categories the first is opportunity or how likely is it or a creature will have the chance to buy those venomous creatures living in heavily populated areas will score far higher next comes aggression we're more likely to become victims of aggressive rather shy species then there's the injection mechanism how well does the animal deliver its venom related to versus quantity in short the amount of venom delivered in a single bite or sting last but not least is potency just how toxic is the venom drop for deadly drop considering these five factors together is a brand new approach that allows to compete for the first time ever all these venomous animals and come up with what is the most lethal animal to humans not too sure that'll be yet but I think we're actually gonna find a few surprises along the way let's take a look at the weapon itself while most of us will have heard of venom how many actually know what it is venom is a mixture of biological toxins unlike a poison which must be swallowed or absorbed through the skin venom is injected into the body during a sting or a bite it can be used for hunting by disabling prey or as a defensive weapon in the face of attack the difference in strength and how the venom functions will have a significant effect on how it works on the human body something that Jamie Seymour has learned firsthand his new study will take him up against the creature that most people think of when they hear the word venom the snake there are more than 30 species of rattlesnake alone all carrying different Venom's while some Venom's target the body's nervous system creating havoc with the complex network of nerves that control its vital functions others attack flesh and tissue effectively starting the digestive process before the victim is even even having bitten its prey the rattlesnake waits for the venom to take effect before feeding someone who has handled plenty of these creatures over the years is Jules Sylvester he's been helping movie makers to get their dangerous animal footage for many years and he's taking Jamie to find North America's most dangerous rattlesnakes and get a venom sample for future testing but in this rugged terrain this medium sized rattler is extremely difficult to spot if you don't know what to look for you can be standing right on top of a meter long Mojave and still not see it so Jamie Seymour has taken the precaution of wearing bite proof Kevlar leg protectors [Music] Oh Jules Jules that's a Mojave very very potent neurotoxin it's the most unusual as most rattlesnakes of hemotoxic yeah that's neurotoxin the Mojave venom is a complex cocktail of enzymes and other proteins forming an incredibly strong neurotoxin designed to block the firing of nerves particularly those controlling the muscles it's the quickest way to stop prey in its tracks nothing like an event we're getting from the other NOC nerves out and it's game over its paralysis and death the Mojave rattlesnake is not the only rattler in these parts in the lower desert nearby is the larger and more infamous western diamondback but despite their overlapping territories each has a very different venom the western diamondback carries hemotoxic venom that attacks blood vessels like many snake Venom's it starts the chemical breakdown of flesh even before the victim is eaten that is your classic western diamondback rattlesnake all the cowboy movies this is the best Hollywood snake in the world this these guys account for more snake bites than any other snake in the country it's obvious the rattles making noise and then what do you want it for it's a warning probably bison not to step on it it's a go away leave me alone the western diamondback is more widespread and likely to be found at the edge of towns and cities another American rattler has adapted to a rather different habitat the Southern Pacific rattlesnake prefers the green coastal climate of the Hollywood Hills the Southern Pacific rattlesnake is the only one that's venomous in the LA area even though we've got thick bush here we're one hour from Hollywood previously categorized as a b-grade or low brisk this species is now emerging as a major threat to people living in the Los Angeles basin as specialist snakebite physician dr. Sean Bush knows only too well and mostly we see Southern Pacific rattlesnake bites because the snow snakes live where the people like to live that is along the coastline and up in the mountains these snakes often stray into people's driveways and backyards and though it may be tempting to try and remove them it is always best to exercise caution and call for help as this man discovered the hard way took things into my own hands and made a big mistake and within an hour - my hand was blown up like a balloon this hospital is used to treating several snake bites a day and when dr. Busch received a phone call to let him know his own child had been bitten he feared the worst my son was actually in the backyard and picked up a little rattlesnake we got bit we actually had five snake my patients in the hospital that day my wife Paige's pain nine-one-one you know I'm thinking the worst and I've seen all kinds of bad things happen to people with snake bites [Music] boy join he did well his hands just a little bruised right now is a little trepidation around snakes now which maybe he should tell tale menacing sound the rattlesnake is in fact one of the easiest venomous snakes to avoid the rattle is a benign early warning system a device for making sure that anything that comes near is made aware of its presence venomous snake stores its venom in glands just behind the eye where it can rapidly supply venom to the injection mechanism by the hypodermic like fangs or finally green teeth the fangs of rattlesnakes are hinged rotating down into a stabbing position just before a strike so how do the rattlesnakes we've seen so far scored against dr. Seymour's ranking system one is particularly dangerous to man it's the notorious western diamondback because this rattler is now commonly seen around southern US towns it has more opportunity to strike at people which given its bold aggressive nature it frequently does its large hinged fangs penetrate deeply into its victim to deliver its venom and though not as potent as that of other Rattlers it can deliver enough venom to be potentially fatal if a bite goes untreated the western diamondback is responsible for the most bites and deaths by any reptile in the United States next we head 12,000 kilometres away to Africa where we discover a snake whose fangs dwarfed those of any rattlesnake much of Africa's West and central regions are still covered by thick forests it's here along the forests edges that we find a snake with a particularly dreadful reputation when it comes to death by lethal injection the gaboon viper really can deliver this solid bodied one-and-a-half meter but slow-moving snake is a superbly camouflaged ambush predator it's so well disguised but it's nearly impossible to see it even when you know it's there through its five and a half centimeter fangs the longest of any snake it injects the largest quantity of venom in the snake world this is thankfully not an aggressive species preferring to retreat rather than attack if approached for any snake envenomations of a human being as a waste of time and energy a snake is injected valuable venom into a human victim may have less chance of hunting prey or defending itself from attack until it is replenished it's toxic supplies and there are plenty of animals that will attack even the most venomous species of snake like the Mongoose and in Mozambique they face a snake that can deliver its venom long distance the spitting cobra takes the defensive use of venom into a whole new league squirting venom with astonishing accuracy muscular contractions squeeze venom through the fangs spraying it up to 3 meters of the eyes of any aggressor causing irritation and blurry vision but there's another African snake more deadly than the Cobra the highly confrontational saw-scaled Viper with its subtle signature sound it inhabits a vast natural range which stretches from North Africa across the Middle East and into Asia to include areas of mass human population well over a billion people in all giving this aggressive serpent plenty of opportunity to bite [Music] professor Julian white is a medical expert in diagnosing snakebites 10% approximately of acute hospital beds in Nigeria are occupied by snakebite patients and the overwhelming proportion of those are Sasuke Viper bites it's huge range and the fact that victims are often a long way from proper medical treatment ensure this is a serious bite risk species so while the gaboon viper has the most formidable set of fangs and is physically the more intimidating it is actually the smaller saw-scaled Viper that is the greatest threat to people living in its territory this deadly predator gets plenty of opportunity to strike and unfortunately it is also extremely bad-tempered and is often lone to attack humans despite its small size it has an impressive set of folding fangs which can inject a fatal dose of moderately toxic venom all in all it kills thousands of people every year 7,000 kilometers away in Asia we find several other contenders for the world's worst venom while most people try to avoid close contact with venomous snakes here there are some who caught danger on a daily basis sacred among Buddhists and Hindus the Asiatic Cobra is a confident species and will bite if alarmed the Asiatic Cobra is also a bit of a show-off and its threat posture has become an iconic symbol of Asia coming face-to-face with these snakes Thai snake charmers uphold a tradition that goes back thousands of years if any snake had an opportunity to bite handed to it on a plate it would be this one - charmers in this village alone have been bitten recently but the Asiatic Cobra is dwarfed by a gigantic relative the longest of all venomous snakes the king cobra at over five meters in length the king cobra can raise enough of its body from the ground to stare a standing human in the face some have lived to tell the tale i've limb bits in nineteen times by the king cobra and i survived many people in our group have been bitten by snakes it's not just me it's more than ten of us I will keep performing until I die [Music] many of the charmers who work with king cobras believe they have a high level of intelligence and it's possible the reptilian performers only deliver dry warning bytes injecting minimal venom in the wild they mostly save their huge venom capacity for their favorite prey other snakes however this part of Asia does have a problem with another more irritable snake the Russell's Viper russell's viper is especially nasty throughout its range it not only causes kidney damage and nasty bleeding effects and in some places particularly for instance sri lanka can cause degrees of paralysis and muscle damage as world this snake is one of the most dangerous in all of Asia preferring the outskirts of cities it kills thousands every year why are so many people bitten by this species there are two times a year when Russell's Viper bites reach a peak they coincide with the planting and harvesting of the rice fields [Music] [Applause] many of the snakes victims are farmers whose remote rural location prevents them from getting the immediate medical attention this bite requires it can take days before a victim can reach hospital long enough for the venom to do serious damage the Russell's Viper strikes at close range and a single bite can deliver over a hundred milligrams of venom as the venom diffuses into the bloodstream it interrupts the blood clotting mechanism leading to hemorrhaging and finally to devastating kidney damage let's consider the worst case scenario what do you do if you're bitten by a venomous snake forget sucking out the venom that's strictly for the movies wherever you are in the world a serious venomous snake bite without proper medical attention can lead to permanent injury or even death [Music] in most cases you need an injection of anti-venom this is an antidote created by injecting small amounts of the true venom into a host animal such as a horse the immune response which follows produces antibodies against the venom these are harvested from the animals blood to make anti-venom we used predominantly horses because one thing big and you can get large volumes of blood from them without causing any problems to the horses and the second thing is there isn't a great deal of diseases that can be passed on from horses to humans what basically happens is you take the venom you inject it into a large horse you give it a small amount and over time you increase the amount of venom that you give to it what porce does is it's immune system then starts to reduce anybody's if you think it's chewing gum as being this antibody that I'm producing and I'm the horse so it produced a chewing gum you have this antibody now and what happens is the venom is a particular shape because it's going to act and lock in almost like a key into a door and if I can take this antibody and wrap that up that key will no longer work so it'll float free in the body but it won't be able to lock on to the bits and pieces in the cells and cause death and problems for humans while antivenoms will neutralize the toxin they cannot reverse the process of any damage that's already done being monitored in hospital is often their central but there's one snakebite where even without anti-venom it is possible to survive the Malayan crate is one of the few Asian snakes carrying a purely neurotoxic venom as a nocturnal hunter it stalks its prey in darkness by following scent trails often entering through an open window or door and the sleeping inhabitants may never even know they've been bitten especially since the fangs are very small as the neurotoxin goes to work it's only the unnerving paralysis on waking that points to a snake bite in the night the toxin blocks nerve endings that control muscles including the rib muscles vital for breathing but unusually this venom can work its course through the body and as long as the victim can be kept breathing through the paralyzing effects they are likely to survive while both Russell's Viper and Malaysian Krait present a serious threat to southern Asia's human population it's the cobra that is the greatest danger here not the mighty king cobra the largest venomous snake in the world but it's smaller cousin the common cobra and again we turn to Jamie Seymour's new classification system the Asiatic Cobra is most commonly found on the Indian subcontinent but its habitat extends further into southern Asia and it shares its living space with millions of people [Music] it's confidence also contributes to inviting up to 15,000 people every year while it's fangs are not the biggest the snake does produce a surprisingly large volume of venom thankfully its venom only scores moderately on our potency scale nevertheless it remains one of the biggest killers in the venomous world [Music] but there is one country that tops all the others put together in the venomous snakes takes Australia its species of venomous snake outnumber the non-venomous ones we've got the most venomous snakes there's no doubt about that Australia is a big place with vast areas of unpopulated country the snakes that live here are hardly pushed for space yet alarmingly there are seriously venomous species that have adapted perfectly to the urban lifestyle of Australia's cities some Eastern brown snake populations now thrive on a diet almost entirely consisting of house mice a great pest control perhaps but being caught by the jaws of this mousetrap is surely worse than having a bad rodent problem and they inject a good deal more venom that was previously thought and like a lot of city dwellers they're easily annoyed the venom of the Eastern Brown is particularly unusual because it causes the blood to clot rapidly however if you survive you may later die from but only by traveling to the remote regions of the Australian outback can we find the even more venomous and ominously named fierce snake if that snake with that sort of venom was present in a highly populated area I suspect you'd be dragging people out of the bush left right and centre as they die the fierce snake is also known as the inland Taipan it inhabits a harsh and extremely demanding environment they specialize in hunting native desert mammals and tracking prey down takes valuable energy so failure is not an option when the price up you want to make sure you grab it you want to make sure you've inject it and you want to make sure it's gonna die so you give it a very potent venom and you give it a heap of it but first by name doesn't necessarily mean fierce by Nature this snake with the most lethal venom known for any land animal is hardly ever seen by a human being it Hansen lives in holes and subterranean tunnels rarely venturing into the open but very similar toxins to those found in the fierce snake can also be found in a snake much closer to home around Australia's coastlines we find a highly venomous sea serpent the olive sea snake is gregarious and confident around human beings and can frequently approach divers and snorkelers after 10 years working with them sea snake expert Glen burns knows how to handle them safely the miele searching for females at the right time of year any movement is usually attracted towards which is why a lot of divers think they're being attacked a male will come zooming up from the bottom basically because they don't see very well they think it's a potential mate and they'll come zooming over to investigate they need a powerful fast-acting venom if they don't disable the fish quickly it will escape and the meal is lost but of all Australia's snakes it's not the sea snake that comes out top nor is it the serpent with the strongest of all Venom's the fierce snake in Australia it's the Eastern brown snake which ranks as the most dangerous to people it is aggressive and fast-moving fortunately it's fangs are relatively small and it rarely manages to cut through heavy clothing historically Eastern Browns were thought to produce a tiny amount of venom but recent studies suggest that this is not the case and their venom has a rare blood clotting quality which if delivered directly into the bloodstream can kill a human in minutes Australia does have more than its fair share of venomous creatures and they're not all snakes there are hundreds of other species that can sting and bite this is the Sydney funnel-web spider as its name suggests it lives in and around the city but it's known to have killed at least 13 people these are the only spiders in the world which are truly lethal prior to the development of anti-venom there was nothing that medicine could do to guarantee survival even in an adult from a major funnel-web spider part both male and female spiders carry venom used for killing their insect prey but it's the male's extra venom component that's a danger to people the females seldom leave their underground burrows whereas males often wander in search of females it's the males that are the more potent to humans part of the reason is when you look at males they come out of their burrows and they go foraging the females stay within the burrows and stay put staying hidden helps to avoid predators but for the times when it does venture out into the open the spider has developed a highly potent toxin which it can use if threatened once you come out of your borrow your then exposed to predators your predators liable to be marsupials and things of that nature so you've got to have this extra component in your venom that you can use for defense there's another venomous Australian spider that resides far beyond the city limits the read-back and its notorious for lurking in dark dry places often right under your nose the Australian War anti-venom is used to treat red black spider bite then all other bites combined including snake life it's a very common problem with probably greater than a thousand cases receiving anti-venom every year and this species is also well traveled they've a fondness for long hauled luggage and they found themselves 7,000 kilometres away in the port of Osaka Japan it arrived on the Asaka docks probably around 1994 and quickly spread so that by 1996 there were probably maybe hundreds of thousands of Redback spiders in Osaka I found high concentrations around the dock area than you normally see even in Australia [Music] back in his North Australian lab Jamie Seymour takes a closer look at these spider Venom's and it is the Sydney funnel-web that poses the greatest threat to humans according to the five-point scale during the mating season funnel-web males are drawn into Gardens and houses increasing the likelihood of a human encounter and though it might rather avoid confrontation it will not shy away from defending itself despite feeding mainly on insects its fangs are long enough to pierce human skin and deliver a small quantity of highly potent venom back on our quest to find the world's worst Venom's dr. Jamie Seymour and venom enthusiast Jules Sylvester head back to the desert in search of the only lethal species of scorpion in the United States the Arizona bark scorpion while spiders and snakes deliver their venom through fangs to inject it into the bloodstream the scorpion uses its sting in the tail [Music] after snake bite scorpion sting is probably the medically most significant cause of envenomate in the world we have no idea how many people are affected but I would suggest it's probably into the billions Jamie Seymour is back with jewel Sylvester this time carrying an ultraviolet light to bring out the natural fluorescence of the Scorpions hard external skeleton this is a big one but not the bad one proud of that piece of bark at the top there that's a barter scorpion you go 130 brother Kevin hey you given absolutely there you got a bark scorpion that after just ten years ago they were losing about 800 people in Mexico just because of this serious name of the advent of the a divinity next six weeks they improved a lot [Music] found in the American Southwest and northern Mexico the bark scorpion does encounter human beings fairly often but is unlikely to sting unless provoked [Music] being small in stature it has a relatively modest stinger delivering small quantities of balance but compensating for its lack of size its venom is relatively potent and prior to the development of proper antivenoms it was a much feared killer it's back in Africa that we find two other particularly notorious scorpions this is the powerfully-built fat-tailed scorpion it grows up to ten centimeters in length though its sting is designed to immobilize insects it can have an equally potent effect on the child although this species rarely ever injects enough venom to kill a healthy adult [Music] the distinguishing feature of most scorpion stings is that the toxins they contain have a very different effect on the nervous system than any of the snakes we've seen sending it into a kind of physiological overdrive with heart rate and blood pressure sent soaring another African scorpion is a wolf in sheep's clothing the Deathstalker more than compensates for its small size and unimpressive looking stinger by having more toxic venom drop for drop than any other species of scorpion Jamie Seymour scale highlights why it is so deadly opportunity to strike is high it's the cause of many stings throughout the Middle East and North Africa where it lurks for aggression it also ranks highly they can be very volatile it have a highly effective stinger that easily penetrates human skin scorpions restrict the tiny amounts of precious venom they administer with every sting which is fortunate because the Deathstalker has extremely potent venom which can cause heart and respiratory failure if injected into a person's bloodstream [Music] for our final group of venomous creatures we returned to Australia but this time we're underwater everything Jamie Seymour needs for this category is right on his own doorstep Australian waters contain many species of dangerous marine stingers and biters but sometimes it's not the venom which delivers the lethal wound and he was present on a particularly fateful day when Steve Owen was stung with a stingray I was on board and had been for a couple of days with Steve and what appears to happen as Steve swum over the back of the stingray from the animals point of view is a big shape coming over the top of it big shape and the water normally means big predator it was not the stingrays venom that actually killed their win it was the puncture wound from the Rays spine it's not unusual to see certainly entire sharks and other big sharks these holes or these gaping wounds around sort of the middle of the shark or down through the gills think of this is really a sharp knife so if that's embedded through your chest and ends up unfortunately something like your heart it's not the venom that does the damage for humans it's more of physical damage from these big spines there are other marine creatures here that are lethal to human beings this is the blue ringed octopus and this is dr. mark Norman he's an octopus expert at Museum Victoria these octopuses are equipped with a really good warning system and it's using brilliant blue rings to flash like police lights to say I am really deadly and if you come too close I'll bite you the venom it carries consists of a highly specialized protein called a tetrodotoxin it has evolved to paralyze prey like crabs quickly the venom is supplied to the razor-sharp parrot-like beak from large venom glands deep inside the octopuses body immobilizing its prey and they have an equally disastrous effect on the human body in situations where people have died from the bites of these octopuses they've been handling them and they've bitten with this very powerful saliva going into their bloodstream and within three minutes they're paralyzed and they suffocate to death in one case in the 1950s two divers had one they threw them to each other on the beach and the more they threw the octopus the brighter the blue rings got and then the guy put the octopus on his shoulder and said I'll take it up the car park and so the and while he's walking up the car pockets bitten straight into his jugular and he was dead within two minutes were still on the list of Australia's most deadly venomous creatures is the harmless-looking box jellyfish each tentacle is armed with millions of minut spring-loaded stinging capsules they inject venom into blood vessels just beneath the skin where it travels rapidly through the bloodstream and eventually to the heart and unfortunately it inhabits inshore waters the kind frequented by swimmers Jamie Seymour has been on the wrong end of the Box jelly's tentacles more than once and I've gotta tell you I mean it hurts it's it's almost a surreal pain but it reaches it to peak level almost instantaneously and stays at that level for about ten to fifteen maybe twenty minutes and then it just shuts off to protect swimmers from the box jellyfish special Nets of the most popular beaches keep them well apart you see these Stinger nets all over the place and they do a wonderful job we've never had a fatality or a near fatality sting inside the nets you swim outside the net it's not a matter of if you get stun it when you get stun and its really playing with your life but the nets which do a good job of keeping the deadly box jellyfish out are no barrier against another member of the jellyfish family one of the smallest killers in the ocean along coastlines and reefs from Australia to Southeast Asia is the miniscule Irukandji jellyfish we started getting jellyfish stings of some sort from inside nets they weren't big box jellyfish stings that was distinctly different they were showing distinctly different symptoms often no larger than a pea no normal stinger mesh can keep out the tiny Hira kanji jellyfish as our duck died down I've got stung across the top of the lip but unlike the box jellyfish the venom of the Irukandji lingers in the victims tissues it's this that gives the sting a delayed reaction see more suspects that it's only when the toxins reached the body's lymph glands that the painful effects kick in I had severe stomach cramps pins and needles through the lower joints and the legs like you would not believe and we're now getting large quantities of painkillers and and it was just hell [Music] far less dangerous to people but fatal to fish is another bizarre marine killer the cone shell whereas most Venom's lethal impacts are based on just a few key proteins that of the cone snail contains hundreds of toxic compounds among them are nerve blocking chemicals that can induce instantaneous seizure and a strong sedative that prevents the prey from struggling but like most snails this one operates at a pretty sedate pace it only needs to feed once a week and it's super strong venom guarantees that when it does hunt down prey it almost always makes a kill however scientists have actually discovered a way to utilize this venom as a super strong painkiller now these animals are cone snails I mean they're basically little chemists has already been a painkiller that's been extracted from the bear and who knows what else may be in there scientists are now beginning to explore the possibilities of using its natural properties to treat serious diseases of the human body as research continues into the medicinal potential of venom in the natural world it's still a formidable weapon and in the ocean the deadliest of all venomous creatures is the box jellyfish it inhabits waters surrounding many popular beaches where stinger nets are deployed to keep bathers safe it is not an aggressive creature and won't deliberately attack a human being but nor is it likely to get out of the way when fully grown it has over a hundred and twenty meters of tentacles armed with millions of tiny stinging capsules making it highly effective at injecting its balance the amount delivered depends on how severe the contact with its highly armed tentacles and it gets worse the venom it delivers may well be the fastest acting and drop for drop one of the deadliest known against people in severe cases death can occur in just two minutes before any chance of medical help of all the creatures we've seen in action from the rattlesnakes of the United States and the venomous spiders of eastern Australia - octopus and jellyfish which one is responsible for the greatest number of human fatalities according to doctor Seymour's ranking system we can focus on three final contenders for the title from the reptile world it's the feisty saw-scaled Viper which narrowly edges out the common Asian Cobra and Russell's Viper to be the world's most dangerous serpent among the spiders and scorpions it's the Deathstalker that tops the lethal list and from the marine contenders it's the ghostly box jellyfish surprisingly many creatures with extremely toxic Venom's measured drop for drop don't feature amongst our finalists simply because they don't get the chance to encounter humans often enough to rate among those most dangerous to people but there is one merchant of venom that narrowly defeats all the others in the danger it poses according to our key criteria the most dangerous venomous creature on earth lacks a big horrible reputation in fact few of us will have heard of it until now the sauce scaled Viper be flying through North Africa Asia and the Middle East and through that area there's a lot of billion people inhabit that area and probably 60 70 80 100 thousand people you get bitten out of that twenty thousand people die each year it's lethal credentials include a highly potent venom but what really sends the fatality rates soaring sky-high is a unique combination of this snakes aggression and proximity to people making rapid and efficient medical treatment crucial for survival it's not the cause this animal has such a lethal venom that people are bitten and died instantaneously it's predominately because they can't get the medical help quickly enough or they don't have good anybody reducing the human death rate from venomous bites and stings means making sure that more people invite risk zones can get fast and effective treatment and there is another crucial factor in determining the toxicity of any venom among the creatures we've already seen there are extremely variable reactions to their bites and stings take the Sydney funnel-web potentially deadly to humans its venom has almost no effect on the local cat and dog population this venom appears to be especially toxic to monkeys and humans but harmless to felines and canines however when it comes to the bite of the North Queensland tarantula it's the other way around human beings suffer localized pain while cats and dogs usually die and surprisingly it is a specific reaction to venom that makes one species an unlikely mass killer the humble honeybee while many of us would shudder at the prospect of venomous snakes and scorpions in our backyard it's actually bee stings that kill more people in the Western world than any other species it's not the direct effects of the venom but it's because people go through what their fertilis anaphylactic shock in other words they're allergic to these bee Venom's things happen like using the muscles around your necks swell up and you stop breathing and that's what kills such a significant difference in reaction to villains has also inspired Jamie Seymour to plan another element for his venom rating system lab based experiments designed to find out exactly how severely each of the world's most toxic venom actually attacks human cells the reason for this is simple what they've done routinely is testing on mice or rats which works well if you want to know how lethal these are against rats and mice but it doesn't tell you anything about how lethal they are on human cells so far dr. Seymour has begun experiments on human heart cells not people of course but cell cultures specially grown for the purpose so these containers here are the key to everything we're doing basically been able to do is grow human cells we have about 10,000 cells in each little we can add venom from any sort of animal we want having done that we can then add it dye to it and that dye will stain up red as the cells die so more and more self die the red of the material we may becomes the results are already proving invaluable venom from the controversial Sydney funnel-web spider has been confirmed highly toxic exceeding the drop for drop potency of the deadliest scorpions tested among the reptiles the most toxic venom tested belonged to the inland Taipan killing over 60% of heart cells in the first 10 minutes thankfully this snake remains remote from human contact in the Australian outback but the most astounding result is the extraordinary toxicity of the box jellyfish venom which began killing human heart cells virtually on contact and which destroyed a hundred percent of all cells within 10 minutes Jamie Seymour has long suspected that box jelly venom is both extremely potent and fast-acting on humans as well as fish now he has the first clinical proof while his groundbreaking research into the effects of venom on human cells is just beginning there are scientists already exploring Venom's potential to cure arthritis heart disease and cancer so these toxins may not always be bad news for human beings who knows we may one day our lives to some of the most dangerous venomous creatures in the world [Music] you

Channel: Real Wild

Views: 2,928,493

Rating: 4.669302 out of 5

Keywords: nature documentary, full documentary, documentary movie, cute animals, baby animals, animals attack, big cats, wildlife documentary, english, hd, discovery channel, national geographic, natgeo wild, Nature documentaries - topic, Animals - topic, planet earth, david attenborough, Animals Do The Funniest Things, Animals Do The Cutest Things, Cute Baby Animals, Funny, Animal, Video, Funny Baby Animal Video, Full Animal Documentary, Snakes, Scorpions, Spiders, Venom, Documentary

Id: L8mxdKMGHKs

Length: 50min 5sec (3005 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 10 2018