The Australian inland taipan is the most venomous snake in the world. But its deadly venom can also save lives: in animal studies, it has been successfully used to prevent chronic heart failure. Even today, snake venom components are used in the pharmaceutical industry and in medicine in the fields of blood clotting and neurobiology, and now also in cancer research. Products with snake venom have long been used in homeopathy for the treatment of rheumatism, for example.
Snake toxin as a pharmaceutical raw material
Poisonous snakes – their bite means between 50,000 to 100,000 deaths per year. In addition, there are countless victims with long-term damage such as loss of a hand or leg. Some snake venoms paralyze muscles and breathing, others disrupt blood clotting and the victim bleeds profusely; cardiovascular disorders and even collapse are further symptoms. But what harms in high concentrations when bitten can also be useful: snake venom, used in a targeted manner – more precisely, the molecules of individual substances – also means healing in cases of high blood pressure, for example, and as an anticoagulant.
Snake venom in medicine
From the venom of the South American lance viper, for example, a substance can be obtained that promotes blood clotting. Batroxobin is the name of the substance with which wounds that occur during operations can be easily and quickly glued shut, so to speak. Before the operation, some blood is taken from the patient and thickened with the snake substance. During the operation, this gel-like altered blood can then be applied to open blood vessels and other wounds, whereupon the blood clumps together and the wound closes immediately. In the nine major industrialized countries alone, ten million people suffer a stroke each year, and 2.5 million people suffer a heart attack. Thromboses are a major cause of these. At the end of the 1990s, pharmaceutical researchers developed the active ingredient tirofiban from an anticoagulant protein in the venom of an African viper – this is the name of the first representative of a group of anticoagulants. These prevent platelets from clumping together and clogging blood vessels. They are administered in acute heart conditions in the hospital because they reduce the risk of heart attack.
Snake venom in cancer therapy
Biochemical analysis of snake venoms is still in its infancy, but the successes are promising. Dr. Johannes Eble of the Institute of Physiological Chemistry and Pathobiochemistry at the Westphalian Wilhelms University in Münster, Germany, hopes that research with snake venoms will yield therapeutically applicable substances in tumor therapy. In fact, he has discovered that the reptile venom could also be suitable for preventing the migration of cancer cells. Cancer is the uncontrolled growth of abnormal body cells. What is particularly dangerous is their invasion of healthy neighboring tissue and the colonization of distant parts of the body – the metastases. Eble’s starting point now is the boundary between the tumor and the surrounding tissue. The most important of these so-called tissue barriers is the basement membrane. It is normally impermeable to cells, but not to metastatic tumor cells. They penetrate the basement membrane and invade other tissues, they enter the bloodstream and affect other organs. To cross the basement membrane, tumors have what are called cell adhesion molecules, integrins, on their surface. Eble found that snake venoms contain active ingredients that target these integrins and can thus inhibit cell migration. “Developing a drug from these venoms that reduces tumor invasion and metastasis is a worthwhile goal,” Dr. Eble hopes, “but we are only at the beginning of a long and uncertain road.”
Snake venom in homeopathy
Snake venom is also sought after in homeopathy. The venom is purified from allergenic components and dried. It is then highly diluted. These remedies are used for diseases as diverse as bronchitis, allergies, joint complaints, hay fever and rheumatism. As reported by “Apothekennachrichten”, Norbert Zimmermann, alternative practitioner and founder of the Center for Naturopathic Treatment in Bottrop, has been using snake venom in his practice for many years: “Snake venoms in low homeopathic doses are highly effective in the therapy of all inflammatory chronic diseases,” he explains. In snake venom therapy (pure toxin therapy), just one hundredth of a milligram of the venom is used.Inflammatory foci in the joints disappear due to the muscle relaxing effect and the strengthening of the auto-immune system by the toxin. By the way, the venom of the snakes is extracted on a German snake farm for pharmaceutical purposes – they are “milked” up to six times a year. The Center for Natural Medicine receives the serum through pharmacies. There, the venom of 40 different snake species is used for rheumatic diseases, joint inflammations and arthritis. There are no side effects. A treatment plan includes ten to twelve sessions, after three injections the patient already feels a significant improvement in symptoms. Private health insurers reimburse the cost of treatment, while patients with health insurance pay the costs themselves. This so far unique treatment method is also said to show amazing and fast treatment successes in the therapy of chronic pain, migraine, neuralgia, chronic kidney inflammation, asthma, neurodermatitis as well as hay fever and other allergies.
