Three brothers who allowed themselves to be bitten by a venomous black widow spider ended up being hospitalized.
The siblings, aged 8, 10, and 12, apparently wanted to be imbued with the abilities of Marvel’s web-slinging superhero Spider-Man and coaxed the venomous arachnid into biting them.
The bizarre incident occurred in Chayanta, Bolivia, and the brothers (whose names were not given) were all hospitalized, and thankfully their conditions improved considerably and they have been sent home.
Their mother had been collecting wood at the time the encounter with the spider was taking place. She found them crying and took them to the Chayanta Health Centre where they were given drugs to counteract the venom of the spider.
The boys’ actions had been borne out of their love for the Spider-Man character (who got his amazing powers after being bitten by a mechanical spider).
The spider was reportedly provoked into biting them after they continuously poked it with a stick. It didn’t take long before they began to suffer from the horrible symptoms of the spider’s venom. They were given a serum for the bites and were released from the hospital five days later.
The case had been revealed at a recent press conference and the Head of Epidemiology of the Health Ministry, Virgilio Pietro had stated, “For children, everything is real; films are real, dreams could be real, and they (children) are the hope of our life.”
Black widow spiders are usually not aggressive, and though their bites can be deadly, they are rarely fatal for humans.
