Pregnant Woman Gets Bitten By Deadly Snake At Work; Hospitalized

A 28-year-old pregnant woman in South Africa was rushed to hospital after she was bitten by a venomous snake at her office.

The unidentified woman was walking toward the bathroom when she was bitten by a cobra in the doorway. The incident took place at her office in KwaZulu-Natal on Friday, IOL reported.

"Reports from the scene indicate that the patient was in her office when she got up to go to the bathroom and found the snake in the doorway. While trying to escape through the door past the reptile, it struck the patient on the hand," Underberg Emergency Medical Services manager Kate Bodmann said in a statement, according to Times Live.

Paramedics arrived at the scene and confirmed that the woman was bitten by a snake in her right hand. She was rushed to a local hospital for treatment.

"Paramedics responded to the scene where they found a 28-year-old female who’d sustained a snake bite from a rinkhals [resembling a cobra] to her right hand. UEMS paramedics suspected the patient sustained a dry bite, but due to the circumstances that the woman was 21-weeks pregnant, she was transported to a Pietermaritzburg hospital," Bodmann said.

The pregnant woman couldn’t be given anti-venom.

"Due to her pregnancy, she could not be given anti-venom, it would be a high risk for her child. They (hospital) are treating her symptoms but it is 50/50 over her finger whether it would be amputated or not," Bodmann added.

The mother and the baby were out of danger. Meanwhile, the reptile was caught and killed by the employees.

Cobra is a highly venomous snake species found mostly in southern Africa and southern Asia. King Cobra is the world’s largest venomous snake that is predominantly found in forests in Southeast Asia and can grow up to 18 feet in length.

In November, a 66-year-old man in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu died of a snake bite while cleaning the air conditioner unit at his home. As the elderly man began cleaning the unit, a black cobra, which was coiled inside, bit him twice in his hand.