Stray dog mauls sleeping 2-month-old in Karimnagar, infant on ventilator

Karimnagar: A two-month-old infant was badly mauled by a stray dog in the Karimnagar district. The incident came to light when the parents took the baby to a hospital at 4 am Saturday morning. The baby is currently on ventilator support in a very critical condition.

The doctor treating the baby, a plastic surgeon at a private hospital, (who did not want to be named), said, “There is a big hole in the cheek. The dog ate all the tissues inside. I could find only the proximal end of the facial nerve. Other parts such as the buccinators masseter facial nerve, part of the parotid, and the parotid duct were completely lost. Zygoma and maxilla have been completely displaced. I managed to fix some parts using vicryl sutures.”

Infant comes from a poor family

Another doctor at the hospital, narrating the details of the incident, said, “The incident occurred at night when the baby was sleeping with the parents, who are economically disadvantaged. The father went to the washroom when a stray dog entered through the open door and started eating the baby. Unfortunately, the baby did not cry out and the mother did not wake up. It was only once the father came back were they able to raise an alarm. Her saree was soaked in blood and it was splattered on her face too. The plastic surgeon did all that he can to save the baby’s life. It has been a challenging surgery and the baby is on a ventilator. At this juncture, we can’t say if the baby will survive or not.”

‘No measures to control stray dog population’

Doctors rued the callousness of municipal authorities in handling stray dogs in the districts as well as in metro cities. Incidents of dogs mauling infants, especially in government hospitals or even outdoors, often surface but no proper action or remedial measures are taken. This is also the breeding season for dogs when they get more aggressive.

“Whenever we complain of stray dogs, a few of them are taken away, sterilised and returned to the same place. As no follow-up is done, after a few months, the sterilisation effect wanes off and the situation is the same again. The population of stray dogs is not controlled. It seems human lives have no value,” said a doctor from Kukatpally, Hyderabad.

Previous major dog bite cases

In September 2022, a duty doctor, walking towards her ward at night, was attacked by seven to 10 stray dogs inside the Erragadda Chest Hospital premises and was left badly injured. She was rescued by relatives of a dead patient who were in the vicinity.

In February 2023, a four-year-old child was attacked and killed by stray dogs near a garage in the Amberpet region. The CCTV footage of the dogs surrounding the child before attacking went viral.

Several dog bite cases are brought to the hospitals regularly. In 2022, four people were reported dead by the city’s government-run Fever Hospital, after they got rabies from dog bites.