While I didn't start this blog to defend unpopular animals (whether pit bulls, alligators, or copperheads) I find myself doing it anyway for two reasons. One is because animals cannot defend themselves, and the less popular the animal, the less likely it is to be defended. The other reason is because inaccurate stories about animals have a way of fueling popular hysteria and mob thinking, while selling newspapers at the same time.

The ridiculous alligator stories in the wake of Hurricane Katrina bothered me, because they were cranked out and repeated without any evidence except for an unconfirmed oral account by a musician whose story has been discredited on other grounds. This has not stopped this blogger from trying to revive the alligator meme on the grounds that I am a right wing supporter of Bush -- and a "naysayer":

Naysayers, mostly rightwing supporters of Presidunce George Bush, have questioned whether the reports of animals eating the corpses of the NOLA dead were accurate. This article notes coroners discussing what they called a particularly poignant case of a woman's body which had been floating for days and had been knawed on by unknown animals.

It would seem that the rightwing naysayers are wrong again, as they have been countless times before.

Considering that alligators have been linked to Bush, and defense of alligators is right wing naysaying, the lowly copperhead would hardly seem worth defending. But I just can't get enough of my right wing naysaying, so here I go again!

Although venomous, the copperhead's bite is almost never fatal. It is a beautiful, inoffensive snake which flees and hides as its primary defense.

How's this for hiding?

The copperhead only bites as a last resort, and it's unfortunate that they are so often killed. In an earlier post, I lamented finding one dead at Valley Forge National Park.

Well, now it seems that a male teenager found a live copperhead in the same park and very foolishly took it to his school, where it bit a fellow student:

A 17-year-old boy, whom police did not identify, had taken the snake to school after capturing it in Valley Forge National Historical Park on Oct. 15, police said.

He took the snake from a box, and it bit the girl's right middle finger, police said.

An unusual story involving (IMHO) human carelessness in provoking the snake, but otherwise not terribly dramatic. What got my attention, though, was the headline (which had been highlighted by a special front page teaser):

Girl bitten by snake at school could lose her arm

A 14-year-old St. Pius X High School student might lose her right arm after she was bitten by a copperhead snake taken to school by another student, Lower Pottsgrove police said yesterday.

Annoyed as I was, I didn't write a post about it, as I figured the girl might have suffered some sort of allergic reaction, or that gangrene might have set in.

But what a difference a day makes!

Because today -- the very next day -- I was treated to another story, of an apparently miraculous recovery, written by a different writer:

Girl bitten by snake has left hospital

The 14-year-old was healing at home after the attack Friday at Pius X. School and police officials began a probe.

By Martha Woodall

Inquirer Staff Writer

The freshman bitten by a poisonous copperhead snake at Pius X High School in Pottstown on Friday was resting comfortably at home yesterday after being discharged from the hospital on Saturday.

The 14-year-old student, Kaitlin Chrobocinski, responded well to antivenin treatment she had received at Pottstown Memorial Medical Center. She was not in danger of having her right arm amputated, said the Rev. Joseph W. Bongard, the president-principal of Pius X.

Bongard said Kaitlin was feeling so much better that she had wanted to return to school yesterday but her parents persuaded her that she needed more rest.

As news reports go, this is only a minor annoyance. The problem is, there's no copperhead rights lobby. The digital brownshirts are silent. I doubt that a single right wing naysayer will join my struggle.

But if I don't speak up, who will?

MORE: In the unlikely event that anyone is interested in a serious evaluation of the risks from copperhead bites, a systematic study was done of reported cases in the Carolinas from 1997-2000. (Of 178 people bitten, 79 were admitted to hospitals, 18 were treated with antivenin, zero died, and in only one case did a digit -- not an arm -- require amputation.)

I'd be willing to bet that the reason only 18 of the 178 were treated with antivenin is because the risk posed by the antivenin is often greater than the risk from the snakebite:

Antivenin, while often the only chance for life many bite victims have, is not without its risks. An equine-derived product, the chance of allergic reaction in recipients is alarmingly high. The most common snake antivenin in the United States is Antivenin (Crotalidae) Polyvalent (ACP) - used for rattlesnake, cottonmouth, and copperhead bites. Derived from horse serum, studies have shown that the chance of acute allergic reaction in a recipient (including anaphylaxis) ranges from 23% to 56%. In cases of only slight envenomation, the risk from the antivenin is higher than the risk from the bite itself - and antivenin will not be administered unless necessary.

(Definitely not a show-and-tell item for kids....)