The number of humans animals kills each year is sometimes surprising. The deadliest creatures are often much smaller and more likely to kill through disease rather than razor-sharp teeth. These creatures come in all shapes and sizes.
Animals are all around us. Because of their close proximity, many people take it for granted.
How truly dangerous some of the animals that are right within our communities can be.
Who knew something as small as a mosquito could wipe out a group of adults?
The World’s Most Dangerous Animals
If you want to know what features make the animal so dangerous: Is it a venomous poison? A sharp sting? Or piercing fangs?
Here are the 18 World’s Most Dangerous Animals on the planet that will give answers to your question.
1. Lions
Lions are one of the most dangerous animals on the planet. They are particularly aggressive and dangerous to humans when protecting the cubs, territory, or carcasses that they have hunted.
Lions are responsible for about 200 human deaths per year, which puts them in the top 10 most deadly wild animals.
Lions typically become man-eaters for the same reasons as tigers: starvation, old age, and illness, though as with tigers, some man-eaters were reportedly in perfect health.
Man-eating lions studies indicate that African lions eat humans as a supplement to other food, not as a last resort.
2. Sharks
A Great white shark, Carcharodon carcharias, jumped out of the water. Great whites are the world’s largest predatory fish.
While sharks are commonly portrayed in movies and television shows as deadly killers, the reality is much different.
Worldwide, sharks account for only several hundred attacks on humans, and they only average six to seven human deaths per year
In the United States, sharks cause about one death every two years. The species responsible for the highest percentages of fatal attacks are the great white shark, the bull shark, and the tiger shark.
3. Pufferfish
Pufferfish, also known as blowfish, are located in tropical seas around the globe.
Though they’re the second most poisonous vertebrate on the planet (after the golden arrow dart frog).
They’re arguably more dangerous as their neurotoxin (called tetrodotoxin) is found in the fish’s skin, muscle tissue, liver, kidneys, and gonads. All of which must be avoided when preparing the creature for human consumption.
Indeed, while wild encounters are certainly dangerous, the risk of death from a pufferfish increases when eating it in countries like Japan.
Even then, accidental deaths from ingestion occur several times each year. Tetrodotoxin is up to 1,200 times more poisonous than that cyanide.
And can cause deadening of the tongue and lips, dizziness, vomiting, arrhythmia, difficulty breathing, muscle paralysis, and if left untreated, death.
4. Elephants
Elephants are the world’s largest land animal, with male African elephants reaching 3m tall and weighing between 4,000 -7,500kg.
Normally we think of elephants as smart, friendly creatures, and they have been a staple of circus performances for many years.
The reason they perform so well is because of their intelligence and their complex emotions and social structures.
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5. The Brazilian Wandering Spider
Many spiders have fangs packed full of toxins but aren’t known to bite people. Unfortunately, the Brazilian wandering spider is not one of these.
Even worse, this spider often lives up to its name and wanders into densely populated areas to seek shelter in dark.
Also in cozy places like the inside of shoes, clothes, log piles, cars, and other places people may stick their hands.
Human death can occur within two to six hours of a bite, typically as a result of lung failure through fever, vomiting, and paralysis also occur.
Bites from Brazilian wandering spiders are uncommon, but don’t let your guard down in their territory.
6. Hippopotamuses
An aggressive hippo male (Hippopotamus amphibius) attacked the car of tourists. Huge hippo males intimidate their opponent with mock charges.
Hippos have even been known to attack boats for encroaching upon their habitat, and they can use their sharp teeth that grow up to 20 inches long very effectively.
They attack by biting, trampling, and will hold their adversary underwater until they drown. “World’s Most Dangerous Animals”
7. Box Jellyfish
Box jellyfish is one of the World’s Most Dangerous Animals often found floating or very slowly moving at speeds close to five miles per hour in waters.
These transparent, nearly invisible invertebrates are considered by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is the most venomous marine animal in the world.
Those tendrils are lined with thousands of stinging cells known as nematocysts, which contain toxins that simultaneously attack the heart, nervous system, and skin cells.
While antivenoms do exist, the venom is so potent that many human victims have been known to go into shock and drown or die of heart failure before reaching shore.
8. The Scorpion
Scorpion stings are painful but rarely life-threatening. Young children and older adults are most at risk of serious complications.
In the United States, the bark scorpion, found mainly in the desert Southwest, is the only scorpion species with venom potent enough to cause severe symptoms.
Worldwide, only about 30 of the estimated 1,500 species of scorpions produce venom toxic enough to be fatal.
But with more than a million scorpion stings taking place each year, deaths from these stings are a significant public health problem in areas where access to medical care is limited.
Healthy adults usually don’t need treatment for scorpion stings. But a scorpion sting can have serious effects on young children.
Read Also: Deadliest Animals to Humans
9. Tsetse Flies
Tsetse flies are found in Africa, living in damp areas along the banks of rivers and lakes. They are the size of a large housefly and feed only on blood.
As is the case for the bugs to come, it is not the actual bite of the tsetse fly that kills humans but the resulting infection that proves fatal.
The tsetse fly resides in the tropical regions of Africa, and its bite infects the host with a parasite that causes African sleeping sickness.
African sleeping sickness is a very difficult disease to treat especially given the lack of medical resources in the area, but without treatment, the disease is fatal without exception.
10. Golden Poison Dart Frog
Poison darts are a large, diverse group of brightly colored frogs, of which only a handful of species are particularly dangerous to humans.
Its poison is called batrachotoxin, is so potent that there’s enough in one frog to kill ten grown men.
Just with only two micrograms roughly the amount that would fit onto the head of a pin but is able to kill a single individual.
Its poison glands are located beneath its skin, which means a mere touch will cause trouble
Deforestation has landed the frog on several endangered lists, but if you’re lucky enough for a rare sighting when hiking, don’t go reaching for it.
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