Published: 19 September 2019
Snakebite is a Neglected Tropical Disease that annually kills over 95,000 people residing in some of the world’s most disadvantaged subsistence farming communities, and leaves 200-300,000 surviving victims with permanent physical disabilities/disfigurements.
Rural impoverished African and Asian communities, and in particular 10-30 year olds, suffer disproportionally high rates of snakebite mortality and morbidity. Snakebite is therefore both a consequence and cause of tropical poverty.
The NIHR’s Global Health Research Programme has funded ground-breaking new research, through its African Snakebite Research Group (ASRG). The Group’s research will support national and regional authorities to design and implement systems to reduce snakebite deaths and disability and collaborating with partner organisations in Kenya, Cameroon and Nigeria will allow the establishment self-sustaining regional hubs of snakebite expertise.
Siting these pilot projects in the different health systems, cultures and environments helps to ensure that the research outputs can be readily adopted for designing and implementing management systems to reduce snakebite deaths and disability in other sub-Saharan African countries.
Find out more about the African Snakebite Research Group’s research.