Another child killed by a dog

[NeverTrustAPoliceman]

Breaking news now. When is this going to stop?

Rip little one.

I also want to add, people are always more likely to be scared of larger dog breeds yet most of the time they are trained better than a lot of smaller breeds. I think a lot of owners of small breeds think they don’t need to try as hard with the training because their dog is small and can’t ‘do as much harm’. There are a lot of elderly people with small breeds such as chihuahuas, terriers etc in our area and most of these dogs can’t even follow basic commands such as sit. Yet, there are a lot of collies, german shepherds, huskies, labs and golden retrievers who are all extremely well trained.

I also know a few families personally that have children that are afraid of dogs. Not through any traumatic experience, just developed a fear on their own. It can be debilitating and it’s something that is detrimental as, like it or not, dogs are everywhere. Children with phobias like this should have access to therapy to overcome it. It has nothing to do with the owners or the dogs, I’ve seen one of the children freak out in hysterics when she was in a car parked on the other side of the road and about 40 foot away from the dog.

I am a big dog lover, we are planning on getting one this year. I use cringy terms like 'fur baby' and anthropomorphise all my animals. I think dog attacks are 90% bad owners. That said I think way too many unsuitable people keeps dog in an unsuitable manner. I would firmly support

1. Ban on lockimg jaw breeds
2. Ban on breeding and sales through unregistered breeders
3. A license to keep a dog which requires a demonstration of safety and welfare knowledge (actually, as a rescuer of an endless stream of maltreated rodents and fish, Id like to see that for all animals)
4. Leash laws along with the provision of specific dog excercising grounds by Local Authorities paid from license fees and fines.
5. Deportation or firing squad for people who don't pick up their dog shit. I will happily volunteer to staff the squadron looks sadly at bin containing my suede work wedges

I 100% agree with your first paragraph. Every annoying dog I ever encountered was a small breed. Allowed to run off lead Willy-Nilly. Jumping up. Yapping and snapping.

I am not vilifying small breeds, I know a number of awesome ones with good owners. But, fuck me, they are outnumbered by the amount of ill-mannered ones I came across. It’s like some people think they don’t have to bother if their dog is small.

No matter the size, if you take a dog on then you need to set boundaries and manners. A few people thought my dog was deaf. I instilled hand signals for the basics (sit, down, stay, leave etc). The amount of times, out on a walk, where someone would stop to chat on a walk and I’d signal sit or down and then be asked “oh, is she deaf?”

Despite my username, I have never been someone who treats my animals like babies. It was an easy way to refer to them with friends and family rather than referring to each by name! They’ve always been fed the most appropriate food. They’ve always been trained and taught manners. They have never been treated as babies. But they have totally been my family.

I DO understand why some people on here “hate” dogs. It must be frustrating and frightening if you encounter dogs that are not under control. But it annoys me with the blanket “all dogs are the devil” sentiments.

I would probably be in favour of all dogs in public being on a lead. With designated areas for off-lead dogs - either renting a field by the hour. Or small sections of, say, beaches, where it’s open to all owners and they all take the risk of going to such a place. However, that does not do anything about the number of fatalities which occur on private property and which are the biggest problem.

The Tweenies (back in their heyday), Made a series of Safety shorts. One of which was about dog safety. Whilst it is very basic and somewhat romanticised in its view of dogs, it still shows that it is possible to teach young children how to keep safe and be cautious around dogs.

The reality is that dogs exists, and to many they are a great companions. However, I do believe that stricter laws are needed in some circumstances.

Another dog thread full of absolute bullshit by pearl clutchers.

If the breed is not mentioned in the very first article then it's not going to be a "dangerous dog". Happy to eat my hat if I'm wrong but remember the sausage dogs that helped kill a woman recently with no dangerous dogs in sight?

Dogs don't have locking jaws, just strong bites.

No, babies and toddlers don't need to look out for warning signs. That's the job of the parent.

Staffs aren't dangerous breeds.

Big dogs cause more damage but are usually better trained and nicer personalities.

Bad owners not bad dogs... fight for control and legislation not banning of breeds you don't understand.

TBF, the case regarding the dog walker has not yet released any clarity regarding what breeds caused her death. There is no proof, yet, that a dachshund bit her - only that they were present on the walk. That kind of “argument” does nothing to help the discussion.

Licences should be brought back but be at various levels depending on type / size of dog and whether it is neutered.

I'm on the fence about muzzles, I think if you are walking a few dogs they are probably a good idea.

But we don't do things properly do we?

I'm only surprised no one has suggested dog behavior should be taught in schools.

@Furries fair. But I'm under the impression it would be classed as joint enterprise if it were people.

A woman died from "multiple penetrating dog bites to the neck", an inquest has heard

A post-mortem examination showed she died from shock and haemorrhage, and her left jugular vein had been perforated.

I would be interested to know if without the bite to the jugular if the result would be the same and the results of further forensic investigation.

Yes, would be interesting to know. It’s a really difficult case.

Part of me would like them to disclose which dogs caused her death - I think they’ve all been held for forensic purposes. Another part of me doesn’t want a breed unfairly demonised. There were too many dogs there and who knows what triggered it.

It’s an horrific situation for the lady and her family/friends.

American bulldogs are much heavier than many women. Those dogs are so bulky and no way could someone easily pull one of those beasts away from a child. They’ve killed so many people in recent years, more than other breeds. Should be banned like pitbulls.

The dog apologists always blame young children as though it’s a 5 year old’s fault for being mauled to death. Or they’ll say their American Bully is a softy. Any breed can flip, but you can kick away a Maltese. Not so much an American Bully.

Completely agree @Furries but if it was a dog people generally say is safe, I think it would/could do a lot to help people understand how essential it is for dogs to be trained and under control which would help dog owners endlessly.

A maltese could be flipped away easily but could 8 and what if they are on a baby?

5 fatal dog attacks involving children in the last year. Let's look at statistics in a bit more detail. Trigger warning: causes of childhood and infant deaths.

2231 stillbirths in a year. Target is to lower that by 704. Poverty still leading cause.

800 children aged 1-9 die each year in the UK. 1 in 8 of those (so 100) are as a result of accidents. The child safety trust says that the leading causes of accidents in children are, in no particular order;
choking/strangulation/suffocation
Fire
Falls
Poisoning
Road accidents
Burns
Water accidents
(Dogs or even animals in general not mentioned, though button batteries are.)

8 of the 10 deaths (all people including adults) in the UK due to dog attack in the last year were from bull breeds - most of those were American bulldogs, followed by mastiff types and English Bulldogs and staffordshire bull terriers. One was a rottweiler, one a husky.

(The two this year so far are currently unknown breeds)

There are 13,000,000 dogs in the UK. 1 in 3 households have one or more dogs as a pet.

As absolutely tragic as 4 childhood deaths a year from dog attacks are, the overwhelming majority of dogs and people, including children, are co-existing safely.

If you want less children to die in the UK, tackle poverty. Educate parents and people who work with children about accident prevention. Ban button batteries and the products that use them. Any one of those things will save many times more children than banning the 13 million dogs in the UK. If you really can't resist going after dogs still, go for the bulldog breeds. Without those, most of the deaths due to dogs last year wouldn't have happened, but let's keep it in perspective: 0.005% of all childhood deaths in the UK last year were as a result of dog attacks. The vast majority (96%) of accidental childhood deaths are nothing to do with dogs.

*sorry, I switch between the number 4 and 5 in that post.

As usual, this thread has already turned into a bunch of people screaming into the void, lost of all ability to debate.

Most children who have a fear of dogs are OK with working dogs like police dogs, sniffer dogs, guide dogs. Because they are predictable and trained for months and years and are not running loose likely to jump up at you when you are going about your own business.

Children (or adults for that matter) are scared of dogs because of a bad experience with them. And that bad experience is almost always down to a "he's just being friendly" owner who sees no problem in a dog jumping all over a toddler. As someone posted upthread, when you're 3 or 4, a Labrador is the size of a polar bear.

Most dog owners are OK and responsible. An ever increasing number of dog owners are not OK, don't train their animals and have zero control over them.

Yes it would be easy to get hold of them.

In the absolute dump I live in, these fucking horrible dogs are bred in peoples houses.

The never, ever go near a vet. No one knows they exist.

Tell a scumbag here that they need to register a dog, they would laugh in your face.

Their are mums at my dads school who laugh that they drive a car without a license, they are thick as shit and don’t care about anything, let alone the throw away dogs they have.

My dds school, not dad

Very sorry to hear that you live in such an awful area 😞

Yup, it’s a shithole. I didn’t really know places like this existed outside Jeremy Kyle until we had to move here. I would have said all the same thing about owners having to be responsible and register dogs etc until I had experience of the sort of people that own dangerous dogs (and not all young men with hoodies and chains, it’s families too).

I’ve been on threads before where people just don’t get that there a huge areas all over the country just like this with people who couldn’t give a shit about anything, let alone registering or training a dog.

It also contains a lot of people explaining (as predicted) that you can’t ban dogs, theirs is lovely, it’s only bad owners, it’s only a few deaths there are worse things out there.

a total ban is unlikely given how widespread dog ownership is, how emotive it is, and how much owners (good and bad) would object.

however, stricter controls are needed and have been sensibly discussed on this thread. Dog owners in my view should accept some (a lot) of constraints on their pets, and those putting safety first should accept a ban won’t happen.

It’s not just about fatalities though is it @Grimchmas as awful as they are. It’s about, bites, scratches, trauma, general nuisance. The fatalities hit the headlines but theres more to it than that.

Take a look at the recent Panorama on dog breeding to see where many of the American Bullies are coming from and why, regardless of breed traits, these dogs don't stand a chance at being normal, well rounded dogs. They are being bred illegally to fund criminal lifestyles and launder the profits thereof. No one in those dog's young life gives a tiny shit about the regulations, the law or their welfare. They would no more adhere to the need for a breeding licence than they would adhere to the law banning drugs, guns or theft. Hundreds upon hundreds of puppies released into public ownership every year who have had a fucking awful start to their lives, often been seriously wounded by humans via ear cropping and tail docking and who are created using fucking awful genetics. It could be any breed and the resulting dog would be an unstable and dangerous animal.

Pet ownership licences that focus on basic dog ownership and behaviour may help - but only at the point these dogs (finally) reach a law-abiding and reasonable home. Which many never do. I'd suggest an additional answer in this case is less about the dogs and more about how an underfunded police service is struggling to track and succesfully arrest career criminals, leaving them free to use dogs to launder their money. If the police were better, these people wouldn't be free to be causing this problem at all.

With the tragic case of the dog walker, the largest dog breed released was a Leonberger. And not just 'any' Leonberger. That specific dog had featured on a BBC programme when she was a puppy and was bought and owned by someone so incredibly unprepared for her, who may have loved the dog but continually ignored what the dog needed and was clueless as to how to help the dog mature. Despite her love for the dog, the dog had puppyhood filled with neglect for what it really needed. Most likely she would have passed any criteria for a licence, desite being unsuitable to care for such a dog and despite having an unsuitable home for such a dog.

The biggest/best predictor of dog aggression is a history of neglect or abuse. That gives you a clearer indicator than breed does. However, some breeds are habitually mistreated - which is why they crop up time and time again. Add to that their size/physicality and they become a bomb that can do huge damage when it goes off.

But banning the breed won't cure this. It won't. You ban bullies and they will pick another breed and supersize that. We know this because it already happened. We already banned breeds and they just moved on to another. They will breed for exaggerated size and muscle and strength and any breed over about 20kgs could be the starting point. A labrador, for example. It'd take about 5 generations (about 5 years) create a highly muscled, highly unstable and highly dangerous litter of labs.

All this hyperbole around the criminals ignoring laws.

”Ah, it doesn’t matter what laws we put in place. There will always be rough people and criminals that don’t listen….blah blah blah…..”

Tell that to the campaigners who successfully changed laws after Dunblane, and who can now look back almost 30 years knowing that the changes they made mean it has NEVER happened again.

Yes @Sep200024 but do you remember what a fuss the legitimate sport shooting community kicked up about it not being fair to responsible gun owners? Just like responsible dog owners now don’t want any controls on dog ownership because they don’t consider themselves to be part of the problem.

Yes, absolutely!

Thank goodness they did not win that fight.

I wonder how much blood they would have on their hands now, 27 years later, if they had.