Snakes-identification and medxcolegal aspect

Snakes are found all over the world, except New Zealand, Ireland and Arctic region. In India about two to three million snake-bites are reported every year, of these about 20,000–25,000 prove fatal. A number of people die because of shock due to fear and others due to want of anti-snake venom and inability of medical officers to identify the poisonous snakes and symptom of poisoning. Every medical officer posted in casualty should be able to identify the poisonous from the non-poisonous snakes and diagnose envenomation syndrome. Many a times Forensic experts are called to the casualty to identify cases of snake bites andat times even the dead snakes. This article describes the salient features of common poisonous snakes of India, and the symptoms and signs of poisonous snake bites.