Eli5 how does anti venom work?

Question

So I know that anti venom is made from the venom of whatever snake that bit you, but what I don’t understand is how does injecting more venom into you help you?

In: 27

Answer 1

That’s because whoever told you left out the most important step! Yes, the first step is harvesting venom from the venomous animal. But then you take a large animal with good natural immunity — horses usually get this unpleasant task — inject the pure venom into THAT animal, and then collect lots and lots of the horse’s blood. Finally, the facility will use filters and centrifuges to separate out the antibodies in the horse’s blood. That’s what’s in the needle — horse antibodies.