An eight-year-old girl has been rushed to the hospital after being bitten by a venomous viper while on an Easter picnic with her family.
The little girl, who has not been named, went to test the snake with her finger in Kinver Edge, Headquarters, on Saturday.
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To her shock, he bit her, causing her finger to “quickly swell up”.
Paramedics later took the schoolgirl to Birmingham Children’s Hospital, where she was injected with an anti-venom serum.
This was announced by her father David Rathbone. Birmingham Live: “She was alerted to the snake’s presence by one of ours and, being a brave girl, probed the striking looking reptile with her finger.
“It is unusual that the snake did not retreat, but hit her on the finger.
“She let out a ‘screech’ and at that moment I grabbed her hand and sucked hard on the wound on the tip of her index finger. The snake still didn’t back down. The snake also hit my arm, causing me to whip it. out of range.”
Mr Rathbone said he took his daughter to Kidderminster Hospital after she “complained of pain and swelling” in her finger.
After only 15 minutes, her “whole arm began to swell.”
She was taken by ambulance to Birmingham Children’s Hospital, where an anti-venom serum was available.
And after she was placed in intensive care, she “received an intravenous infusion of anti-venom serum, from which she became very ill, since this is a strong medicine.”
Mr Rathbone said: “She was closely monitored after her tetanus shot. The second intravenous infusion was given at around 1 a.m. today.”
The father added that his daughter is now doing well, although he is “a bit tired” of missing out on a planned Easter egg hunt.
According to him, as a precautionary measure, she is under the supervision of doctors.
We previously reported how a three-year-old boy was bitten by a viper in Surrey’s Lightwater Country Park while hunting for his toys.
Lewis Wise’s leg was so swollen that he “was in great pain” and could not walk.
Another father was left to fight for his life after being bitten by a viper on Hounslow Heath in West London.
Josh Rose, 27, was trying to pull a three-foot snake out of his son’s stroller when it attacked, leaving him ‘paralyzed’, unable to speak and ‘foaming at the mouth’.
He was rushed to the hospital, where he was placed in intensive care, but was able to return home safely after 24 hours.
Vipers are the only venomous snakes in the UK wild.
They have a distinctive zigzag pattern on their backs with red eyes and a vertical pupil.