This was on the news on television the other night. The BBC reported that there has been a 34% increase in recorded dog attacks against people causing injury. The figure does not include attacks by dog-on-dog and other animals. It’s a worrying trend because although there was a surge in dog adoptions during Covid-19, the increase in the population size of domestic dogs in the UK is 15% over the time that there has been a 34% increase in dog attacks.
So, the number of dog attacks on people is more than double the increase in the number of domestic dogs. This implies that the dogs recently adopted are not fully socialised in my view. Or they’ve been poorly trained or not trained at all.
This supports what has been said earlier about the kind of dogs adopted during the Covid-19 which on occasions have been imported from the European continent where they were bred in puppy mills. Puppies bred in this way are often poorly socialised or perhaps even unsocialised.
Poorly socialised dogs will be more fearful of humans and therefore more prone to attack. It’s a simple formula. And it also implies that some inexperienced people who adopted dogs during Covid did not provide their new dog with a suitable environment in which to thrive and to integrate.
In 2022 there were almost 22,000 cases of out-of-controlled dogs causing injury compared to 16,000 in 2018. The police confirm that there had been more reports of dangerous dogs.
The BBC obtained the information from a Freedom of Information request made to 43 police forces, the results of which can be seen in the Infographic above.
Two examples
Lily-Blu Whitehurst was attacked by a friend’s dog that was sitting on her lap. She was at a friend’s home sitting on the sofa. She leant forward and the dog attacked her. The dog bit her face between her eyes and damaged her nose and almost damaged her eyes. It appears to have been an entirely unprovoked attack carried out instinctively by the dog. The BBC does not try and explain the reason.
It was a traumatic event for the 18-year-old. She believes that “it will continue to have an effect on me for the rest of my life.”
The owner of the dog was fined £700 after pleading guilty in court. Their dog is now subject to restrictions such as wearing a muzzle when left at home and a requirement that they should be in a cage when visitors are in the home.
Sarah King is a postal worker. She was delivering letters in Rotherham in January 2022. A dog that is a cross between a Rottweiler and a Shar Pei had placed his mouth up against the homeowner’s letterbox. She delivered the post through the letterbox and the dog bit off the distal phalanx of her right little finger. She now wears a prosthetic attachment to the finger. It was a clean bite and there was blood everywhere she said.
Postal workers
There is a strong argument that dog owners should protect postal workers delivering post in two possible ways:
- Place a cage around the letterbox inside the home so that the letters fall into that cage. This would protect postal workers because dogs could not get their hands.
- Place a letterbox outside the home on the wall next to the door. This of course to would protect postal workers.
Anxiety or worry
The BBC interviewed Dr. Rachel Casey, director of canine behaviour and research at the animal welfare charity Dogs Trust.
She says that anxiety or worry is often a cause of dog aggression. Dog owners can recognise when the dog might become aggressive because their ears go back in their body posture changes. Owners should be aware of this change. My argument is that dogs should not be anxious or worried if they have been fully socialised. This is about a failure to socialise properly and train dogs.
Reason why the friendly and loyal Labrador is the most likely dog to attack
