Editor's note: On January 1, one of the women who was attacked, Kati Mather, said on social media that the dog is a Rottweiler-husky cross and was not a pit bull.

I didn't want to spend part of New Year's Eve writing about another attack involving a pit bull–Rottweiler cross.

But I'm at it again after CKNW News reported that three people were taken to hospital after being mauled in Richmond.

An 80-pound pit bull–Rottweiler cross has bit a 21-year-old woman more than 100 times, according to the local radio station.

She's in critical condition after trying to protect a toddler.

The dog also attacked the woman's twin sister and a person who tried to help.

The sister's boyfriend owns the dog, which is being kept by the Richmond Animal Protection Society after being shot by a Mountie.

There was also a Christmas Day pit bull attack that maimed Fort St. John resident Robin Elgie. He's recovering in an Alberta hospital.

These are not isolated incidents but rather form part of a pattern that needs to be addressed by municipal officials across the province.

Late last December, a pit bull and Rottweiler cross-bred dog mauled a 16-day-old baby girl in the Victoria suburb of Saanich.

Back then, I reported that DogsBite.org had reported that 176 Americans were killed by pit bulls between 2005 and 2013.

DogsBite.org lists 32 people who died last year after being bitten by dogs in the United States. Of those, 28 involved pit bulls or Rottweilers or crosses with these breeds. Most of the victims were seniors or children.

Earlier this year, I wrote about a pit bull attack on an 84-year-old woman as she was gardening in Chicago. She managed to survive.

Bayden Wilson, a 10-week-old boy in Dallas, wasn't so lucky when the family pit bull attacked him.

"The father managed to grab the animal by the neck and haul it outside, where he shot the dog twice, killing it," the website notes. "The child was rushed to Children's Medical Center where he was pronounced dead."

Dog attacks don't always involve humans. Sometimes pit bulls will kill or maim other dogs. I witnessed a tiny mutt's near-death experience last year in the off-leash area beside Trout Lake in Vancouver.

Pit bull lobbyists have tried to soften the breed's image by rebranding it as a Nanny Dog. Try telling that to the Mounties who had to respond to the 80-pound beast today in Richmond.

A couple of years ago, Burnaby council had the guts to bring in a breed-specific bylaw, which imposed higher licensing fees on the owners of potentially vicious dogs.

This came after a staff report noted that pit bulls were responsible for 24.7 percent of all dog bites in the city in which the breed could be identified.

The City of New Westminster, on the other hand, dropped its classification system the same year.

Here's the message to pit bull owners: move to the Royal City or stay in Vancouver and take your dog to Trout Lake, but avoid Burnaby.

No wonder Burnaby mayor Derek Corrigan wins every municipal election with some of the largest landslides in the region.