After living through two venomous snake bites in the span of about a week, one six-year-old Australian boy is crediting his prayers for his survival.
Joel Canning, who lives in Wongan Hills, recently encountered a Pseudonaja nuchalis, known more commonly as the western brown snake, outside his home. The snake, a native of Australia, is believed to be one of the most venomous snakes in the world, Yahoo7 reported.
Immediately after he was bitten by the speedy snake, Joel walked “quite calmly” to his mother, Pippa, and asked, “If you get bitten by a venomous snake in Australia, do you go to heaven?”
“And I said, ‘Yes,’ and then he went down,” Joel’s mom recalled, noting her young son must have known not to panic because doing so would “pump the venom faster.”
Pippa, terrified of what had happened, was able to muster enough strength “to pick him up [and] walk through the house with him while he was convulsing.” She said his “eyes were rolling back” and he was “hissing and I knew he wasn’t getting enough oxygen.”
A boy has survived after being bitten by a venomous snake twice in eight days.
Hear how six-year-old Joel Canning beat the odds @sunriseon7 #perthnews pic.twitter.com/34x62FRfLb
— Matt Tinney (@Matt_Tinney) July 29, 2018
“So, every third step I stopped and did rescue breaths before being able to get him in the back seat of the car,” she said.
Once Joel arrived at a nearby hospital, he was flown to Perth, where he was treated for the bite. But soon the nightmare revisited them. Just eight days later, little Joel was bitten again by the same kind of deadly snake.
While his mother panicked, fearing her son certainly wouldn’t survive a second venomous bite, it was her son who comforted her, reminding his mother he survived the first bite and would recover from the second one the same way — through prayer.
“I thought I was gonna survive again because I survived the first time, and I did. So when I prayed for that, my prayer came true,” Joel said, confident he would fully recover from the second snake attack.
While he’s fully recovered physically, the snake bites have still left a lasting impression on Joel. He is now suffering from anxiety attacks in school, fearing he might be bitten again.