Are Pit Bulls Really Dangerous?
Police in Nassau County, N.Y., are searching door-to-door for two pit bulls that went on a bloody rampage, attacking a teenage boy and three women during a 30-minute period Wednesday (Feb. 13).
"One literally went for my leg and [the] other was trying to jump on top of me, but I was hitting them, and I was punching them," Janelle Manning, 24, told CBS New York. "They both weren't letting go, once they got a hold of my leg."
Because of her leg injuries, Manning now struggles to walk up and down stairs, CBS reports. "These dogs were, like, trained to kill; trained to hurt and viciously attack people," she said.
But do pit bulls deserve their reputation as vicious "attack" dogs? An overwhelming amount of evidence suggests they do.
A five-year review of dog-bite injuries from the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, published in 2009 in the journal Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, found that almost 51 percent of the attacks were from pit bulls, almost 9 percent were from Rottweilers and 6 percent were from mixes of those two breeds.
In other words, a whopping two-thirds of the hospital's dog-attack injuries involved just two breeds, pit bulls and Rottweilers.
Other studies confirm these statistics: A 15-year study published in 2009 in the American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology revealed that pit bulls, Rottweilers and German shepherds were responsible for the majority of fatal dog attacks in the state of Kentucky. [See What Your Dog's Breed Says About You]
And a 2011 study from the Annals of Surgery revealed that "attacks by pit bulls are associated with higher morbidity rates, higher hospital charges and a higher risk of death than are attacks by other breeds of dogs."
The authors of that 2011 study go on to say, "Strict regulation of pit bulls may substantially reduce the U.S. mortality rates related to dog bites."
Paying the price for pit bulls
As a result of the overwhelming evidence against pit bulls, home owners and landlords often must pay significantly higher insurance premiums if they have a pit bull or other recognized "bad dog" breed on their property. [Infographic: Dog Bite Incidents]
Fans of pit bulls are quick to assert that a dog's propensity for attack depends in large part on its owner and how it is raised, and there's considerable evidence that owners of pit bulls and other high-risk dogs are themselves high-risk people.
A 2006 study from the Journal of Interpersonal Violence revealed that owners of vicious dogs were significantly more likely to have criminal convictions for aggressive crimes, drugs, alcohol, domestic violence, crimes involving children and firearms.
These findings were confirmed in a 2009 report published in the Journal of Forensic Sciences. The authors of that report wrote, "Vicious dog owners reported significantly more criminal behaviors than other dog owners," and they were ranked "higher in sensation seeking and primary psychopathy."
And a 2011 study, also in the Journal of Forensic Sciences, found that "vicious dog owners reported significantly higher criminal thinking, entitlement, sentimentality and super-optimism tendencies. Vicious dog owners were arrested, engaged in physical fights, and used marijuana significantly more than other dog owners."
Are Pit Bulls Dangerous | Dog Bite Statistics | LiveScience
