A team of snake hunters in the early hours of the morning at a monastery in Rangoon in Myanmar was busy putting about 30 snakes caught in recent months in large canvas bags after finding them in the city's homes, with the aim of returning them to their habitats in the wilderness.

The volunteers, a unit unparalleled in the Southeast Asian country, then place the bags in a pickup truck and drive to a location outside the city to release the captured reptiles into their natural habitat.

Shui Li and her team often receive reports from terrified residents calling in this unit to get rid of python, cobra or snakes they find in their homes or apartments.

"I like snakes because they are not hypocrites," Shui Li told AFP at one of her snake sanctuaries.

Near two twisted snakes, she added, "If one accepts their nature, they are wonderful."

But Ko Tu Aung, a burly man in his forties who has hunted snakes since 2016, recounts that he was hospitalized seven times for treatment for bites he suffered.

Attempting to catch snakes that threaten the lives of the population and return them to safe habitats (French)

The team includes 12 members and last year rescued about 200 snakes around Rangoon, Myanmar's largest city.

Thanks to videos circulated on social networks showing the couple pulling snakes from the drains of the dishwashing sinks or from pipes, extensions and gutters, they became nicknamed "the prince and princess of snakes".

Python snakes, cobra and snakes

These volunteers rely on donations to keep their work going, allowing them to provide everything they need from protective equipment to gasoline for what they call an "ambulance", a purple truck they use for their missions.

They are especially captured by "Burmese snakes", non-venomous snakes up to 5 metres long that suffocate their prey from rats and other small mammals until they die, and on the streets of Rangoon there are also highly venomous cobra and bongari snakes.

The latest figures provided by the World Health Organization showed that 1250,15 of the <>,<> people who were bitten by snakes in the country had died.

Last year, the team rescued about 200 snakes around Rangoon, Myanmar's largest city (French)

This death rate from snakebite is among the highest in the world, largely due to a weak health system and unequal access to antivenoms.

Snake hunters are not only "fast and agile," they should be able to guess where the snake might be hiding in the house, Ko Tu Aung explained.

Their task requires a great deal of composure and coolness in the face of venomous snakes.

The experienced fisherman said the chance of being bitten by the snake was up to 90%.

In March, for example, the team spent two days outside a house on the outskirts of Rangoon trying in vain to push a cobra family out of the lower tier in which it was located.

Snakes hiding inside the concrete often spit venom at them when they tried to pierce the wall to get it out, according to neighbors.