Photos show the process of collecting snake venom to produce life-saving anti-venom

The disk is clear plastic, so the handler can move it along the snake's body and see exactly where they need to grab the head.

The snake believes it's biting the handler and pierces the cellophane, releasing its venom into the shot glass.

Billy Collett, the operations manager at the Australian Reptile Park, said the amount of venom released by the tiger snake in the above photo is enough to kill over 50 adult males.

In this image of a Coastal Taipan, one of Australia's most dangerous snakes whose bite can cause paralysis, the amount of venom it released into the shot glass is enough to kill over 100 grown males.

Each snake's venom has its own distinct color when it is frozen.

Taipan venom turns pink, King Brown venom is a deep yellow, and Tiger snakes have a light yellow venom.

Venom from Australian Reptile Park has helped save 250,000 lives in Australia, which is home to over 100 venomous snakes and one of the only places with more venomous snakes than non-venomous snakes.

Horses are vital to anti-venom development as their bodies naturally develop antibodies to fight off the venom from snakes. The healthier the horse, the more antibodies it produces.

Albert Calmette was inspired to make anti-venom after rainstorms in Saigon, where he was living at the time, displaced a large number of cobras and four people died from snakebites.

Calmette began injecting small amounts of venom into various animals that had immunity to it and by extracting these properties, developed the first anti-venom.

Horses are still used in anti-venom manufacturing today because they have enough blood to produce large amounts of antibodies for anti-venom and can fill a blood bag quickly. A horse can fill a six-liter bag with blood in less than 30 minutes.

The animals are injected with a small amount of venom, and their blood is drawn every two weeks.

Because horse blood is so valuable to the manufacturing process, one bag of horse blood can cost as much as $500.

The cost of production for one small vial of anti-venom can be between $15 and $20.

In places like Costa Rica and Australia, where only one to two people die from snakebites a year, anti-venom is funded by the government and can be accessed for free. But not everywhere is as fortunate.

In the United States, anti-venom can cost as much as $39,000 per vial, Smithsonian Magazine reported.

As helpful as anti-venom is, it is not as widely accessible as it should be. As many as 137,000 people die from snakebites annually.

The cooperative can only legally catch the Russell's viper, the common krait, the Indian cobra, and the Indian saw-scaled viper. The four snakes are also the most common venomous snakes in India.

But a growing number of people in rural areas are bitten by less common venomous snakes. Traditional anti-venom doesn't work as well on these bites, and their rural location makes snakebite victims hard to access.

In sub-Saharan Africa, an estimated 30,000 people die from snakebites annually.

The Kenya Snake Research and Intervention Center aims to make the first anti-venom in East Africa.

Because patients can't always afford the anti-venom, some manufacturers have stopped producing anti-venom for sub-Saharan Africa.

As a result, the region has a severe shortage of anti-venom.

The center hasn't been able to set up an anti-venom lab to develop the anti-venom and has not been able to set up a horse farm. Horse farms require vast swaths of land, upkeep, and the horses themselves.

Setting up an anti-venom manufacturing lab can cost between $10 to $20 million, according to David Williams, an anti-venom scientist with the World Health Organization.

Matyas Bittenbinder is working with the Naturalis Museum in Leiden, Netherlands, to produce antibodies in a lab, eliminate the need for horses, and reduce the amount of venom needed from live snakes.

By reducing the need for horses, labs could theoretically produce anti-venom in bulk in labs and reduce the prices for anti-venom.

If all goes to plan, the research could produce an oral tablet to neutralize venom's effects.