Children are victims of dog bites due to irresponsible dog ownership, parenthood, and managers of school institutions in Serbia

Abstract

The prevalence and the incidence of dog bite studies are mainly based on hospital records. However, in this study, the information about dog bites to children was obtained by searching Serbian online newspapers, between January 2008 and May 2018. Sixty-nine articles from Serbian online newspaper report dog bites to 79 children between January 2008 and June 2018. Children over 6 years old (school class) constituted 65% of the sample and 51% were boys. Most commonly, children were bitten by dogs of known owners (59%). Stray dogs were involved in fewer bites to children (41%; P < 0.05). Children sustained the greatest number of dog bites during the spring months (37%) and the lowest in the summer (14%). Mongrels were involved in 37% of all bites followed by terriers in bull type (21%). Head, face, and neck (32%) were the most common individual site of injury from dog bites. Most children (68%) sustained bites without previous interaction with dogs. Data collected from newspapers on dog bites to children cannot provide a real insight into the scale and severity of the problem. However, these data can be the trigger for further studying of this problem by health workers, veterinarians and scientists, and a warning to local authorities to tackle the problem of irresponsible dog ownership.