Spitting cobra bites ten-month-old baby in North West

A ten-month-old baby is in hospital after being bitten by a Mozambican spitting cobra.

Beeld newspaper reported on Monday that the baby, a foster child living with a couple in Rustenburg in the North West, was bitten in his cot on Wednesday, the Afrikaans daily reported.

Social worker Berdine Venter said it was suspected that the snake had fallen from the thatched roof onto the cot.

His foster mother heard him scream at 8.30pm and he was rushed to hospital. A Mozambican spitting cobra was found on the carpet of the baby room.

Venter said the boy was still in hospital but that he was breathing on his own.

He was removed from his biological parents when he was four-months-old and placed in the care of the Rustenburg couple.