Clifton Study and Statistics, A Reliable Source?

By WhoIsColleen

Updated: March 5, 2014

When Dogsbite.org popped on the scene back in the late months of 2007, the fledgling founder was grasping for statistics.  She would reference the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) study that had long before become irrelevant, as the participants in the study had already concluded that the collection of data was not a foundation for breed specific legislation due to the unknown “x” factor.

Lynn hadn’t had enough time to truly ramp up her own statistics based on media reports, and truth be known, she has no clue how to go about truly monitoring and investigating records of dog bites or fatal attacks.

So, she did the only thing she could do, turned on to Merritt Clifton’s media-based statistics.

But, who is Merritt Clifton?

According to Clifton, he has spent “the past 25 years  doing research and providing information service to the humane community worldwide as editor of the [self-published] Animal People newspaper and in many related advisory capacities to organizations doing dog sterilization vaccination, rescue and adoptions.”

Well, that all sounds polished and professional.  But if we take a more in depth look at that statement made by Clifton in a recent “Viewpoint (Letter to the Editor)” style feature in a small local west coast newspaper that caters to a large number of part-time residents, we see there is more to that glossy finish.

Clifton’s Dog Attack Deaths and Maimings, U.S. and Canada, 1982 – 2007 “study” was greatly flawed, as has been depicted by numerous individuals over the years.  His statistics are based on media accounts.  Period.  This in itself is problematic in providing complete data, as not all dog attacks are reported by the media, as admitted repeatedly by Dogsbite.org members reguarly.

He also focuses on cases that require “extensive hospitalization treatment” yet never provides a definition of such term to viewers of his incomplete tallies that he submits to the public, and on as many [real] newspaper’s comment boards as possible, as his ‘study.’ So, a reader of his work is left to wonder if required stitches are considered in some cases to be extensive treatment, or if it may mean only cases requiring life-saving measures.

In addition, his tallies have gaping omissions of pertinent information.  In July of 2003 the CDC published “Nonfatal Dog Bite — Related Injuries Treated in Hospital Emergency Department — United States 2001” report in the MMWR Weekly.  In the report, it is stated that “Of an estimated 333,700 patients treated for dog bites in emergency departments (EDs) in 1994 (2), approximately 6,000 (1.8%) were hospitalized (3).”

But in Clifton’s tallies, over the two and half decades (25 years) he accounts for only 2,363 total bites, less than half of a single year as reported by the CDC during the time in which his tallies were being collected.  And, for only the bites recorded by the CDC in the United States, but Clifton was collecting his media-based data from both the U.S. and Canada. Clifton accounts for approximately 1.6% of the total number of projected bites resulting in hospitalization as tracked by the CDC.

This is only one of the major flaws identified in Clifton’s data collecting methods.  KCDogBlog has provided a number of detailed dissections of Clifton’s math methods, in Misusing Data to Support Personal Agendas  (2009) KCDB describes Clifton’s mad-math-methods in shelter euthanasia reporting; Merritt Clifton – The Numbers Just Don’t Add Up (2011) KDCB addresses the glaring inconsistencies of Cliftons “study”; and in More Misinformation, Deceit and Attempts to Mislead from Merritt Clifton (2013) KCDB demonstrates the inability Clifton routinely displays in obtaining and reporting with as little accuracy as he can in effort to further project his personal agenda.

Clifton’s other research is commonly called into question also.  For instance his methodology of data collection pertaining to a rebuttal of a Milwaukee groups’ estimated number of feral cats generated a scathing blog post by LA Animal Watch back in 2008.
As a follow-up to that blog post, an Animal People subscriber contacted Clifton via email chastising his “juvenile and unprofessional” response to LA Animal Watch’s Ed Mazuika in which Clifton is reduced to name-calling of Mazuika, adding that his behavior had cost him credibility with her as a subscriber.  Clifton’s return email response?  “Ask me if I give a crap!” Clifton goes on to assume full credit for reducing shelter killings in the U.S.  In addition, Clifton shared his expertise was a result of his 30-years of journalism and that in addition he also laid claim to developing an evaluative approach to baseball statistics that helped to inspire the “Sabrmetric revolution,” results of which appear on every sports page.  YES! You read that right!!  Thanks to Clifton, BASEBALL stats exist today!

So?  This isn’t real news.  We just wanted to touch on what we do know about Merritt Clifton, laying a foundation for the second part of this series of articles.  In this series, we’ll peek behind the magic curtain of ANIMAL PEOPLE, a self-published online rag co-founded by Clifton and his former wife in 1992.  We’ll examine Clifton, the man, and his undeniable agenda.

Read part 2 of this series!