One man’s poison is another man’s cure

Snakes are milked for their venom Keystone Archive

The world’s largest breeder and keeper of snakes is a Swiss pharmaceutical company headquartered in Aesch near Basel.

Pentapharm runs a serpentarium in Brazil and supplies customers all over the world with therapeutic products based on snake venom.

Some 10,000 snakes, mostly South American lance adders (Bothrops moojeni and Bothrops atrox) are kept at the farm, which was set up in 1981 to ensure continuity and quality of supply.

The company itself was founded in 1948 and extracted compounds from plants and animal tissues to serve as active ingredients for the pharmaceutical industry.

The extraction and purification of proteins became a key technology and this led to the focus on snake venom.

Blood coagulation

Snake poison products are used as tools in the diagnosis and treatment of blood coagulation disorders.

“From the role of snake venom which is primarily the immobilisation of the prey, there are two actions,” Michael Janssen, head of marketing and sales, told swissinfo.

“These are actions on the nervous system and actions on the blood circulation system. We have concentrated on the actions of snake venom on the blood coagulation system.”

The snakes are kept in open-air parks designed to replicate their natural living areas.

From the age of two, they are milked once a month.

Each snake produces about 50mg of venom at a time, which is dehydrated and exported to the production facility in Aesch for purification and processing.

Wider use

Nowadays 200 snake venom proteins are known, though only a few have gained broad acceptance and are used in biomedical science.

Evidence suggests that their action in blocking the formation of blood vessels used by tumours might be significant for cancer research.

Snake venoms contain properties that affect nerve growth, and some components of the poisons appear to have an anti-viral effect. Scientists are still baffled as to why this should be so.

Although well known for its snake venom products, Pentapharm, is also active in the production of ingredients used in cosmetics, especially substances which have a soothing effect on the skin.

The privately owned company employs about 160 people in Switzerland.

swissinfo, Vincent Landon

snakes

There are about 4,000 species of snake worldwide.
Only ten per cent have venom that is of medical importance to human beings.
Venom is mainly used to obtain prey and as a last resort in defence.
Pentapharm keeps 10,000 snakes at its farm in Uberlândia in southern Brazil.
Its snake venom products are used to diagnose and treat blood coagulation disorders.