Centipede bite: first aid and when to see a doctor
A bite from the big red-brown centipede, the alupihan, is very painful, but it is not deadly. Wash it, cool it, and watch for the signs of an allergic reaction. Most of the pain is gone within two days.
Centipedes come indoors in the wet months looking for damp and for the insects they eat. If you keep finding them, our general pest control and prevention visit deals with the damp spots and the insects that bring them in.
First aid for a centipede bite
- Wash the bite with plenty of soap and water. Do not clean it with alcohol.
- Cool it with ice wrapped in a clean cloth: ten minutes on, ten minutes off.
- Note the time of the bite and, if you can, what the centipede looked like. A doctor will ask for both, with the person's age and weight.
- Do not pick it up to show anyone, even if it looks dead. A photograph is enough.
The usual signs are pain, redness and swelling where it bit. Less often the area goes numb or the lymph nodes near it swell.
When to go to the hospital
Go to the nearest emergency room straight away if the person bitten has any of these:
- Trouble breathing
- A fast heartbeat
- Swelling in the throat
These are signs of an allergic reaction to the venom, and they need treatment in hospital: the staff check the breathing and heart, may give oxygen, fluids through a drip and medicines, and look after the wound. Without those signs, a trip to the emergency room is usually not needed. Call a doctor if you are not sure, and have a doctor look at a bite on a small child.
How long a centipede bite lasts
Symptoms most often last less than 48 hours. In some people the swelling and tenderness stay for as long as three weeks, or go down and then come back.
How long the symptoms of a centipede bite last
Are centipedes in the Philippines poisonous?
They are venomous: a centipede bites with a pair of claws behind the head that carry venom. University of Florida entomologists put it plainly: the venom is not strong enough to kill a person. The big centipedes, which grow up to about 15 cm, can give a painful bite. Small ones often cannot get through human skin at all.
The long-legged house centipede that runs across a bathroom floor at night is a different animal. Penn State Extension calls it harmless, and it feeds on silverfish, cockroaches and spiders.
Do centipedes carry rabies?
No. Rabies is a disease of mammals, such as dogs, cats and bats, and a centipede is not one. A bite from a dog, cat or rat is a different matter: see do rats have rabies.
Keeping centipedes out of the house
Centipedes live in dark, damp places and hunt at night. A house that keeps finding them usually has two things going on: somewhere wet, and plenty of small insects to eat. Deal with both.
- Dry it out. Fix dripping taps and pipes, keep the bathroom ventilated, and run a dehumidifier in a closed room that stays damp.
- Cover the drains. Fit a fine screen over floor drains, and keep water in the trap of a drain that is rarely used.
- Seal the gaps in concrete floors, block walls and around pipes where they come through.
- Clear the hiding places outside: pots, planks, stacked hollow blocks and leaf litter against the wall.
- Cut their food. Centipedes eat insects. Fewer silverfish and cockroaches means fewer centipedes.
A slow, rounded animal that curls into a spiral is a millipede, which does not bite. This page in Filipino: alupihan. If centipedes keep turning up indoors, book a general pest control visit. We cover Pampanga, Bulacan, Bataan, Tarlac and Olongapo.
Sources
- MedlinePlus (US National Library of Medicine), Centipede, read 5 October 2026
- University of Florida IFAS Extension, Pillbugs, Sowbugs, Centipedes, Millipedes, and Earwigs (ENY-221), read 5 October 2026
- Penn State Extension, House Centipedes, read 5 October 2026
- US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, About Rabies, read 5 October 2026
Tell us what you have found
Send the pest, the town and roughly how long it has been going on. That is enough for us to say what the treatment would involve and what it depends on.