THANDI XABA
A 17-year-old girl is in a stable condition in Mediclinic, Bloemfontein, after being bitten by a Cape Cobra on their farm, Marino, in the Bultfontein district. Ané Meyer is a grade 11 learner at Oranje Meisies Secondary School.
Hospital spokesperson, Alida Venter, says when she woke up at around 10:00 yesterday and moved around in her bed, the snake bit her on her left shoulder. It was between her two head pillows.
Her mother went to her room to determine what kind of snake it was. When she lifted the top pillow the Cobra was laying curled up on the bottom pillow.
Ané's mother immediately rushed her to Mediclinic’s Emergency Unit, and her father, Francois, followed shortly with the snake after he had killed it.
They think the snake might have come in through the bedroom’s glass sliding door. Venter says Ané, along with a farmer from the same area, Peter Bramley, who was also bitten by a Cape Cobra just a few days prior, are both recovering well in ICU after the separate incidents.
Bramley was bitten while attending to chickens on his Holmesdale farm, 10km outside Bloemfontein.
His wife, Lexi, says the snake was on a wall when it bit him on the hand. Bramley was rushed to hospital and the snake was later killed.
