Accidents with poisonous animals in Brazil by age and sex

Abstract

Introduction: accidents with poisonous animals are a common clinical emergency in several tropical countries, mainly in the fields and rural areas, constituting a public health problem, including pediatric. Objective: The objective is to analyze the morbidity, mortality and lethality according to age and sex in cases of poisoning by snakes, scorpions and spiders in Brazil. Methods: data on poisoning by snakes, scorpions and spiders that occurred from 2009 to 2013 were collected in the online database of the Information System on Diseases of Compulsory Declaration (SINAN) of the Ministry of Health. Results: were recorded 28.812 cases of snake bites per year, 60.370,8 with scorpions and 25.786,4 with spiders. Most deaths were caused by snakes (119 per year) and also showed higher lethality (0.41%), followed by scorpions (79.6 deaths) with a lethality of 0.13% and spiders (13.2) and the lowest mortality (0.05%). In males individuals were most cases of snake bites, whereas in accidents scorpions and spiders was observed little difference in frequency between men and women. The age group with the largest number of poisonings records was 20-39 years. Conclusions: there is a progressive increase in cases of poisoning from the first year of age until the age range 20-39 years, and after this, begins a decrease in cases. Children, adolescents and elderly adults are most vulnerable because they have higher lethality rates, especially in the snake and scorpion accidents.