Scorpion Venom is the Most Expensive Liquid in the World fact

Scorpion Venom is the most expensive liquid in the world costing up to $39 million a gallon. Like other expensive liquids such as penicillin, insulin, patchouli, human blood, cobra venom, and horseshoe crab blood, scorpion venom has medicinal uses.^[1][2]

The protein in scorpion venom is used for the treatment of conditions like multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease and more.

Specifically, the venom of the deathstalker, a particular type of scorpion, fetches the highest price.

The reason the liquid is so expensive is that scorpions are usually “milked” by hand and produce at the most 2mg of venom at a time.

There are 3,785,411.8 milligrams in a US gallon, so in other words, to get a gallon of scorpion venom someone has to milk scorpions something like 1,892,705.9 million times, generally by hand, in a lab, without getting stung, assuming you got a perfect 2 milligrams every milking session.

FACT: Although people have built machines for scorpion milking, for example a machine that can milk 4 scorpions at a time, the process is still slow.

FACT: Deathstalker scorpion stings won’t kill you, but apparently it hurts 100x more than a bee sting.

1. The 15 Most Expensive Liquids on Earth, Some of Which We Even Use. Brighgtside.me.
2. Scorpion venom is the most expensive liquid in the world — here’s why it costs $39 million per gallon. BusinessInsider.com.