There have been no deaths in Australia from a confirmed
Australian spider bite deaths per year
There have been no spider bite deaths in the last ten years, according to the ABS data speadsheets. In fact, according to the Australian Museum, the last recorded spider bite death in Australia was in 1979. No-one has been killed by a spider in Australia since.
A few facts about Australian spiders
Only two Australian Spiders can kill humans – It's true. In the last two centuries, only two Australian spiders have ever killed people with a bite – the famous Redback spider, and the Sydney Funnelweb. And we now have antivenoms for both types of bite.
The most poisonous animal in the world lives off the coast of Australia: the box jellyfish. This jellyfish - also known as cube jellyfish or stinger - has 15 long tentacles that are full of deadly poison.
There have been no deaths in Australia from a confirmed spider bite since 1979.
If you try to catch a huntsman and it runs towards you, it isn't attacking. It is trying to get to a safe place, away from the giant human thing looming over it. Given they have poor eyesight, sometimes they get it a little wrong and head towards us instead of away from us.
An estimated 5 per cent of Australians have arachnophobia, but there are plenty of others happy to get close to the creepy crawlies.
In Australia they are only found in the southeastern part of the country, from South Australia to Queensland via Victoria, New South Wales and Tasmania. You won't find them in the dry and arid zones. On the other hand, huntsman and wolf-spiders are found all over the country.
Sydney Funnel Web Spider
Found nearly exclusively in Sydney, this spider is often considered the most deadly in the world. With fangs that can pierce through fingernails, and one specimen reaching 10cm stretched out, this spider is serious business. A single bite can kill a human in 15 minutes.
You can be prepared without making it scary. There are all kinds of dangerous things in Australia. Spiders are only part of it: we have stingers, blue-ringed octopus, stonefish, sharks, snakes…but fear of wildlife isn't a reason not to move here. Just remember, your home country likely has dangerous creatures too.
Australia has an international reputation for having some of the most dangerous animals in the world. And yes it's true, we have a lot of spiders, and it's sad when we hear people say they don't want to visit Australia because it's too dangerous. So let's set the record straight.
While it can sound like something out of a horror movie, in Australia the transition from late summer to fall can trigger what is known to the locals as spider season.
Pollution from motor vehicles could be killing thousands more people than road accidents, with new research finding more than 11,000 Australians die prematurely every year from transport emissions.
The most dangerous job was machinery operator and driver, which accounted for 40 per cent of deaths by occupation in 2021. This included road and rail drivers, mobile plant operators, and machine and stationary plant operators.
Spreading diseases such as malaria, dengue, West Nile, yellow fever, Zika, chikungunya, and lymphatic filariasis, the mosquito kills more people than any other creature in the world.
There's not enough food inside a house for a huntsman spider, so they're best off outside." Dr Harvey said the safest method, for both people and spiders, was to use a container. He said while they can give a painful bite, they don't pose a risk to humans.
Huntsman spiders are not normally aggressive towards humans (except for females guarding their egg sacs). They are more likely to run away than attack, unless provoked.
If you find a huntsman spider in your house, yard or on your property, the best thing to do is to leave it alone. These spiders are not aggressive and will usually only bite if they feel threatened.
This spider is large and black. A bite from this spider can be life-threatening. A bite will usually cause severe pain, sweating, vomiting, difficulty breathing and muscle twitching.
The estimated incidence of snakebites annually in Australia is between 3 and 18 per 100,000 with an average mortality rate of 0.03 per 100,000 per year, or roughly 1 to 2 persons, down from 13 persons per year in the 1920s.