Animal campaigners claim the increasing number of dog-bite victims admitted to Sussex Hospitals is due to thugs using animals as weapons.

Department of Health statistics show the number of people in the counties admitted to hospital after being attacked by a dog has increased from 56 in 2004, to 78 in 2008 – a rise of 40%.

Across Sussex, a total of 327 people visited accident and emergency departments with bite wounds during the same period.

They included 146 casualties at Eastbourne District General and Hastings Conquest Hospitals, 76 at the Royal Sussex County in Brighton and Princess Royal in Haywards Heath, 66 at St Richard’s Hospital in Chichester and 39 at Worthing and Southlands Hospitals.

Across England, 16,939 people needed hospital treatment for dog bites over five years, with the annual total rising by 36% from 2,802 in 2004 to 3,837 in 2008.

The RSPCA said it had “huge concerns” about the growing misuse of dogs and called for tougher penalties to force owners to take “proper responsibility” for their animals in both public and private places.

A spokesman for Sussex RSPCA said: “Our inspectors are seeing more and more youths and gangs using dogs as weapons.

There is a major problem with people having dogs as status symbols.

They are using them to look tough, intimidate others, and training them to be aggressive and attack people and animals.

“They believe if they have a dog they won’t be stopped by the police in the same way they would be if they carried knives.

It’s not illegal to have a dog in most cases and we are seeing more and more people with stereotypicallymacho breeds.”

Such breeds included Staffordshire bull terriers, rottweilers, mastiffs and Akitas – all of which are legal to own – as well as pit bull terriers, which are banned under the Dangerous Dogs Act alongside Japanese tosas, dogo Argentinos and fila Brasileiros.

The RSPCA is supporting attempts to extend the 1991 Act so owners are responsible for attacks in homes and gardens.

Currently, an owner can only be prosecuted if the attackhappens in a public place.

But the RSPCA argued the main challenge was ensuring enough police time and resources were spent enforcing the law.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said comprehensive legislation was already in place to deal with people who failed to control their dogs.

But it had recently commissioned new research into dog aggression against humans.