Tourist dies after being bitten at snake charming show on Egypt vacation

A German tourist has died after being bitten by a snake that slithered up his pants while watching a show in Egypt with two other members of his family, German police confirmed in a statement on Monday.

The 57-year-old man was in the audience at a snake-charming performance at a beach resort hotel in Hurghada,  on the Red Sea, when the incident occurred earlier this month.

The show was part of the entertainment program at a hotel complex and involved two snakes, “presumably cobras,” police said, “some of which were placed around the necks of audience members,” authorities added.

During the snake charmer’s performance, one of the snakes crawled into the man’s pants and bit him on the leg.

“He subsequently exhibited clear symptoms of poisoning and required resuscitation,” the police statement said.

He was taken to a local hospital, where he later died, it continued.

The investigation into the circumstances of the death is being conducted by the Memmingen Criminal Police Inspectorate under the direction of the Memmingen Public Prosecutor’s Office, police said.

The results of a toxicological examination are still pending.

The man, who has not been named by police, was from the Unterallgäu region of Bavaria in southeastern Germany and was vacationing with two family members, police said.

According to the World Health Organization, available data indicates that 4.5-5.4 million people are bitten by snakes annually. Of this, 1.8-2.7 million develop clinical illness, and 81,000 to 138,000 die from complications, it says.

High-risk groups include rural agricultural workers, herders, fishers, hunters, working children, people living in poorly constructed houses and those with limited access to education and health care, the organization’s website states.

In Canada, venomous snakes are rare, and bites are infrequent, with only one reported snakebite-related death in 2026, according to the online data platform World Population Review.

According to ScienceDirect and the Canadian Wildlife Federation, there are three endemic venomous snake species in Canada: the Western Rattlesnake, found in British Columbia’s Thompson Okanagan region; the Prairie Rattlesnake, found only in southwestern Saskatchewan and southern Alberta; and the Eastern Massasauga, found only in Ontario on the eastern shore of Georgian Bay, the northern Bruce Peninsula, a small area in the Niagara Peninsula and in the Windsor region.

In 2026 so far, India has the highest number of snakebite-related deaths, reporting 51,100 fatalities, followed by Pakistan, Nigeria and Bangladesh.