case report: a 9-year-old boy with severe injuries following dog bites

the reason why children are more prone to a dog bite is elusive. some propose the theory that a young child who is playing can be interpreted as aggressive by the dog. however, the fact that in some reports children were killed by dogs while asleep proves that this theory does not hold in all cases. in this case, a 9-year-old boy was attacked by 8 different races of dogs escaping from a serologic research institute. at presentation, he was suffering from severe lacerations in head, neck, thorax and lower limbs. unilateral neck abscess, cervical and mediastinal emphysema was detected in serial radiologic studies. to conclude, we can only draw attention to the fact that every year in the united status, 5% of all children between the ages of 5 and 9 years are bitten by dogs every year, 1 in 5 million dogs kills a child by biting and there are currently 52 million dogs in the united states and 10 million in france. something should be done to increase the awareness of public authorities and dog owners to this problem for which, unfortunately, preventive legislation seems to be advancing at a snail’s pace.