“Dangerous breeds,” dog bite statistics, and the Merritt Clifton report

Part 1: Numbers

Which breeds bite most often? Which breeds do the most damage when they attack?

Don’t ask the Centers for Disease Control.

Breed "is no longer considered to be of discernible value" when addressing dog bite prevention, according to a CDC spokesperson.

The most important factors affecting the odds of a dog bite or attack have always been the ones any dog person can rattle off: Puppy socialization. Training. Pack behavior. The dog's health. The dog's care and condition. Something as simple as never leaving a small child unattended with any dog. Size of the dog: when big dogs bite they generally do more damage than little dogs --- although that's a moot point if you're six weeks old.

If you want facts on dog aggression, read A Community Approach to Dog Bite Prevention, the AVMA’s groundbreaking 2001 task force report. [You’ll find it in the sidebar, under More Dog Links]. Seminal quote:

Dog bite statistics are not really statistics, and they do not give an accurate picture of dogs that bite.

For the record, the AVMA task force included representatives from the American Veterinary Medical Association; the American Academy of Pediatrics; the American College of Emergency Physicians; the Professional Liability Insurance Trust; the American College of Veterinary Behaviorists; the American Medical Association; the National Animal Control Association; the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; and the Humane Society of the United States. There are actual footnotes, too.

Is there a bite report for the footnote-averse? Given the boundless, staggering ignorance that influences so much public debate on the subject of dog bite prevention, you know there is. For those convinced that pit bulls send more people to the hospital than all other breeds combined – because "you never read about Lab attacks in the paper" -- the Clifton report is the go-to reference.

I’m embarrassed for people who cite it. It’s that bad.

Merritt Clifton’s study is actually a list of severe dog bites. The title itself ["Dog attack deaths and maimings"] is misleading, since the list is a compilation of "dog attacks doing bodily harm," including some that are fatal or disabling. Clifton’s only source is the press: specifically, press accounts of dog bites requiring “extensive hospitalization” [never defined, so this might include anything from treatment of sepsis to multiple surgeries] and caused by “clearly identified” animals. [“[T]his table covers only attacks by dogs of clearly identified breed type or ancestry, as designated by animal control officers or others with evident expertise, who have been kept as pets.”] The numbers aren’t organized by year or location, and readers have no way to access the original press accounts and follow-up articles. There is a disclaimer of sorts --- “dogs whose breed type may be uncertain” are excluded, as are police and security dogs and dogs trained to fight --- leading logical readers to assume that the list must include virtually all severe bites by dogs of identifiable breeds.

Clifton’s report never mentions that there is a huge discrepancy between actual hospital records and press accounts of dog attacks --- between relatively objective data, in other words, and highly subjective reporting and editing with an eye to selling papers. The report fails to acknowledge that a number of factors are involved whenever any dog bites. The report includes statements about dog behavior which have no basis in science, and statements about breed-specific traits which bear no relation to the actual history, behavior or modern development of the breed being discussed [in this case, the German shepherd]. Clifton’s concluding statements regarding the inevitability of attacks by certain dogs are impossible to substantiate, and as a result seem simply prejudiced and inflammatory.

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Here’s an important CDC number to keep in mind: based on hospital records, each year some 6,000 people in the United States are hospitalized as a result of a dog bite or attack. [From the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report: “Of an estimated 333,700 patients treated for dog bites in emergency departments (EDs) in 1994, approximately 6,000 were hospitalized.” I imagine that number has increased, but for the purposes of this post I’ll stick with 6,000.] 6,000 hospitalized each year: not simply treated in the ED, but requiring hospitalization due to the severity of the dog bite or attack.

According to Clifton's report [which, once again, is based entirely on press accounts], during the 24-year period covered by his study there were a total of 2,209 “[dog] attacks doing bodily harm” in the U.S. and Canada. 1,182 of those attacks were by pit bulls and pit bull mixes. (Lumping mixes together with so-called purebreds makes no sense from any standpoint, but Mr. Clifton lumps them together --- so I will, too, again for the purposes of this post.)

1,182 severe attacks by pit bulls and pit mixes in the U.S. and Canada over a 24-year period [according to the Clifton statistics] works out to an average of just over 49 severe attacks by pit bulls and pit bull mixes in North America per year.

If Clifton’s pit bull numbers are correct, and no more than 49 of the 6,000 or so hospitalizations due to severe dog bites in the U.S. each year are a result of pit bull bites or attacks, then pit bulls and pit mixes are responsible for less than one percent of those hospitalizations.

.82%. Eighty-two hundredths of a percent of hospitalizations due to dog bites in the U.S. each year are a result of pit bull bites or attacks, if the press has accurately represented the number of serious attacks by pit bulls and pit mixes.

This might be a good place to mention that the pit bull is one of the most popular breeds [or types] in the country. Using shelter numbers as a very rough means of estimating the number of pit bulls [registered and unregistered] in the general population, even low estimates end up in the millions. A board member of the California Animal Control Directors Association [CACDA] told me in 2005 that only labs and lab mixes are more common in California shelters. On sites like this, out of a total U.S. population of over 70 million dogs you’ll find estimates of 3 million to 10 million pit bulls.

Could the press be failing to report severe attacks by pit bulls?

While I struggle to get my face under control, check out the screen cap at the top of this post. “East Lubbock, Texas: Elderly man shaken by pit bull.”

Terrifying headline. But he wasn’t actually hurt, you understand, just… shaken.

What about other breeds? Let’s take a look. The only state that has attempted to track dog bites statewide by breed, using hospital records, is Texas. The Texas Severe Animal Bite Summaries were posted online by the Texas Department of Health Zoonosis Control Group from 1996 through 2002. No reports have been issued since then, for a couple reasons: the recorded information had never been complete [some counties didn’t report] and the Texas Department of Health believed the numbers were being misused and misinterpreted. (How do I know this? I phoned them and asked.)

Look at blue heelers: in one year, “blue heelers” and “heeler mixes” caused injuries that required six people to be hospitalized in Texas, according to the 2000 Severe Bite Summary provided by the Texas Department of Health.

Clifton seems unaware that the blue heeler, the Australian blue heeler, the Queensland heeler and the Australian cattle dog are all names that refer to the same breed. They are listed separately in his tabulation. In any event, according to Clifton’s list of press accounts, all of them were apparently responsible for a total of just six severe bites throughout North America over the 24 years covered by his study. (If I didn’t know the breed better – and I like heelers – I might assume that only the ones in Texas bite.)

Take chows. [Please. I still can’t process that Jean Donaldson went from border collies to Buffy ;~)] Based on the numbers provided by the Texas Department of Health, chows and chow mixes accounted for 54 hospitalizations in the state from 1996 through 2000.

According to press accounts tabulated in the Clifton report, there were 57 severe attacks by chows and chow mixes over a 24-year period throughout the entire U.S. and Canada.

Or 66 severe attacks, if you count the mixes with “chow” listed last, as in “Akita/Chow mix.”

And what determines the predominant breed in a mix for the purposes of this report? Why does the Clifton report use “akita/chow mix” rather than “chow/akita mix”? And what is a “chox mix”? What is a “Dauschund”? What is an “East Highland terrier”? I live across the river from East Highland, and I never knew they had their own terrier. “Great Pyranees,” “Weimaeaner,” “Fila Brasiero,” “Doge de Bordeaux,” “Buff Mastiff”… Stop, you’re killing me.

As proof of media bias, the Clifton report has value. The media have done a bang-up job convincing the public that only "dangerous breeds" hurt people. Editors in a shrinking market know that it's more lucrative to rail against pit bulls than talk about the importance of puppy socialization and parent supervision and how to prevent resource guarding. Clifton’s list illustrates perfectly what the AVMA Task Force on Canine Aggression calls “media-driven portrayals of a specific breed as ‘dangerous.’”

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In Part II of my look at Merritt Clifton’s dog bite study I’ll review his “Analysis.” Clifton writes that misunderstood German shepherds bite often, but only to pull children from harm’s way; that the GSD has developed “three distinctly different kinds of bite” to control sheep, and uses the same bites on people; that chows are not a common breed; that it is the “custom” to dock pit bulls’ tails; and that “temperament is not the issue, nor is it even relevant,” since the great majority of “dangerous breeds” maim or kill whenever they have “a bad moment.”

Stay tuned.

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As an addendum, here is an account of a severe dog bite that, like most, received no press coverage.

I heard about the attack from a student -- a friend of the girl who was injured -- and I sent my phone number to the family with a request that the girl’s mother call me if she wouldn’t mind discussing the incident. The girl’s mother gave me the details that follow.

The girl, who was twelve at the time, was staying at her aunt’s house for the night. The families were close and the children all loved the friendly, thirteen year old family dog. That night the girl went into the guest bedroom and reached down to give an affectionate pat to the dog, which was sleeping near the door to the room. The dog lunged up and bit the girl’s face, and didn’t let go. “The dog shook her like a rag doll,” the girl’s mother told me. That tired phrase doesn't sound nearly so hackneyed when it comes from a parent struggling to describe a violent attack on her child.

The girl’s upper lip and part of her nose were torn away, hanging in shreds.

The girl underwent reconstructive surgery at a local hospital where her aunt worked as a nurse. A few days after the attack, the aunt saw the plastic surgeon in a hallway. She introduced herself as a relative of the injured girl and said to the surgeon, “I bet you never saw anything like that before.” The surgeon laughed out loud. “I stitch up five dog bites a week,” he said.

The girl’s mother told me that her daughter’s reconstructive surgery was successful and that no scars would be visible after a few years, though the girl’s lip remained numb: a special concern, since she had played the flute. The dog, a yellow lab, was euthanized.