A dog might be a man's best friend, but it is surely no friend of babies as new research has shown that it is wiser to put off buying a pooch till your kid is at least 5 years of age. The reason for this according to reserachers is that toddlers are immature and might unknowingly provoke dogs, which may react violently.
"Our study showed that the number of attacks on children decreases with age and is highest at 1 year of age," said Dr Johannes Schalamon of the Medical University of Graz and a co-author of the study published in the March issue of the journal Paediatrics.
Schalamon's team monitored 341 children who were treated for dog bites at various trauma centers in Austria between 1994 and 2003. The reserachers then tracked the canine population by breed through a dog register. It was found that the chances of a kid being bitten by a dog decreased with age. Children under the age of 12 months were more likely to fall a victim to dog bites.
Overall it was found that 73 percent of dog bites occurred in children aged less than 10 years. German Shepherds and Dobermans were the fiercest breeds and were involved in more cases of dog bites than the other breeds. The risk of getting bitten by either of these was five times higher than a mixed breed or a Labrador retriever.
Expectedly, children were more likely to be bitten by their own pets or pets or relatives or friends. Spaniels, Shi Tzu and Maltese were the breeds that were least likely to bite. "I would recommend to supervise younger children more closely when they are in contact with a dog and postpone the purchase of a dog until children are of school age," Schalamon said.
The reserachers concluded by saying that dogs have hunted in packs and are used to dominance, "In view of this rigorous hierarchical system in a pack, dogs may regard newborns as well as toddlers as subordinate," they argued.
