There is a quiet crisis unfolding in classrooms, on school transport, and in special education (SEND) settings across the world. It is a global issue and yet it doesn’t make headlines as often as it should. It rarely triggers emergency meetings at the Department for Education. But for the teaching assistants who go home with bite marks on their skin, for the transport workers who give themselves a pep talk before starting every shift, and for the teachers who have been hit, kicked, spat on, and bitten while simply doing their job, it is a very real, daily, and increasingly dangerous issue.
At BitePRO®, we exist because bite injuries are not a fringe concern. They are a serious occupational hazard for staff working with individuals who may lack the communication skills or emotional regulation to express distress in any other way. And the evidence now clearly shows that the frequency and severity of these incidents is rising.
In early 2026, the BBC reported on the experiences of SEND transport staff in Leeds, UK who said they were being “regularly subjected to attacks by pupils” on school journeys. One transport assistant, Emma, described being bitten three times by the same eight-year-old boy, leaving her with a permanent scar. She required hospital treatment and a tetanus injection following one attack. “It’s not what we signed up to do,” she said:
“We signed up to provide a service; we didn’t sign up to be used as punch bags. Some of the kids will just lean over and pull your hair or punch you around the face. I’ve spoken to many assistants who have been attacked or come home covered in bruises.” – Emma, Transport Assistant at Leeds City Council
Her case is not isolated. Unite, the union representing the transport workers, confirmed that staff were dealing with a rising number of violent outbursts from children in SEND schools. Transport workers eventually went on strike over safety concerns, and the dispute was only resolved after the council agreed to hire additional staff, implement risk assessments, and issue mobile phones to passenger assistance workers.
Meanwhile, in Devon, headteacher Christopher Tribble painted an equally alarming picture of life in UK schools. Chris said that he has been hit, kicked, spat on, and bitten by pupils in his school. He claimed that violence against teachers has increased dramatically since the pandemic and it was “becoming more apparent and more regular across schools.” He reported witnessing staff sustain bone breakages, facial injuries, cuts, grazes, and bites throughout his 20-year career.
Data from the Health and Safety Executive suggested reported acts of violence by pupils against school and college employees in the south-west of England had more than doubled in the past decade, with 521 staff reporting injuries from pupils over ten years, including broken bones, cuts, bites, and bruises. The number of incidents rose from 32 in 2015 to 79 in 2025. But these are not just numbers. These are real people being violently assaulted in the workplace and the issue is being swept under the rug.
The scale of the issue extends well beyond individual schools or councils. A BBC investigation into the South East of England found that between 2019 and 2024, local authorities paid out tens of thousands of pounds in compensation to staff injured during school violence, and the latest government figures showed a 35% increase in pupil suspensions for physical assault against an adult in school in just one year, rising from 1,470 to 1,997 suspensions in Kent, Surrey and Sussex alone during the autumn term.
Across the south-east, 440 injuries to staff caused by acts of violence were reported to the Health and Safety Executive over a five-year period, with 106 recorded in 2023/24 alone. Injuries reported across the country included loss or reduction of sight, concussion, fractures, dislocations, and crush injuries.
In Norfolk, at the Duke of Lancaster school, a specialist setting for autistic children, staff went on strike after claiming reports of assaults were not being taken seriously. The National Education Union said basic health and safety needs were not being met and that violence had become “normalized.”
The word “normalized” is perhaps the most troubling of all. When staff stop reporting incidents because they assume nothing will change, the official data underrepresents the true scale of harm. And when organizations fail to treat bite injuries as the serious, potentially infectious injuries they are, they fail their people entirely.
It is important to be clear that biting and physical aggression in SEND settings is not a behavior problem in the traditional sense. For many individuals with autism, learning disabilities, or communication difficulties, physical outbursts are expressions of distress, frustration, pain, or overwhelming sensory input. Staff working in these environments understand this, and the vast majority approach their roles with extraordinary compassion.
But understanding the reason for challenging behavior does not protect you from the injury it causes. A bite wound, regardless of the context in which it occurs, carries genuine medical risks, including infection, tissue damage, and in some cases, the transmission of bloodborne pathogens. Staff deserve to be protected.
Everyday special education teachers and staff walk into school classrooms ready to support students with complex needs. However, what many people don’t see is the level of physical and emotional stress placed on educators in these settings.
The challenge in SEND environments is compounded by the complexity of needs being supported. Pupils may be non-verbal or pre-verbal. They may have significant sensory sensitivities that make physical de-escalation more difficult. They may be larger and stronger than the adults trying to support them. And too often, they are in settings that are understaffed, under-resourced, and under-trained for the level of need they are being asked to meet.
Last year, BitePRO® conducted a Special Education Staff Safety Survey where we asked over 100+ educational professionals including teachers, paraprofessionals and behavioral specialists from regions across the globe about their shared experience working in SEND settings. The survey highlighted a consistent pattern across special education schools that revealed high injury rates, frequent exposure to aggressive behavior and limited access to protective equipment.
Key findings from the survey showed that from the number of respondents over 92% had been injured or exposed to aggressive behavior while working in schools. A further 52% had experienced aggressive or injurious behavior on a weekly basis, while 49.6% of staff required immediate medical attention after a student related injury.
These shocking statistics show that the issue of aggressive behavior and biting in SEND schools is far more widespread than you may have imagined. Injuries are a common occurrence for many special education staff, and not simply a rare or unexpected event.
It highlights the main problem around perception when it comes to speaking about issues involving young children or vulnerable individuals, in that talking about it can sometimes be seen as stigmatizing or socially unacceptable. This makes things worse by hiding the issue instead of addressing it. So, instead of finding a solution that benefits both the teachers and students, the problem is ignored indefinitely.
The fact of the matter is that educators and staff are being bitten and assaulted in the workplace. Apart from the clear trauma this inflicts on teachers, in our survey 72% of participants said that aggressive behavior has negatively impacted their mental health. The knock-on effect is that teachers are quitting their jobs in droves. More than half of the respondents to our survey (53.3%) said they have considered leaving their role because of safety concerns.
Teachers simply don’t want to work in an environment where their physical and mental health is not taken seriously. And this creates a retention problem for schools, employers and educational boards where they can’t hire enough qualified and experienced professionals to do the job. Educators see further understaffing and the perpetual cycle repeats itself.
This is not exclusively a problem in the UK alone. In the United States, the picture is similarly alarming.
In Connecticut, the 2023–24 school year saw a 44% increase in physical and verbal confrontations, totalling more than 30,000 incidents statewide, an average of 166 per school day. Nearly 7% of all students faced suspension or expulsion during the same period.
Gary Steck, CEO of Wellmore Behavioral Health, noted that “almost every day we hear from educators who have been hit or injured,” adding that many believed the surge in mental health challenges during the pandemic would fade, but it has not.
Federal data from the US National Center for Education Statistics found that 67% of public schools recorded at least one violent incident in the 2021-22 school year, amounting to approximately 857,500 violent incidents nationally. Schools themselves cited the lack of adequate alternative placements for disruptive students and insufficient funding as the biggest barriers to reducing violence.
Early educational articles from The Hechinger Report in early 2026 documented what teachers across the country were experiencing first-hand. Elementary teachers nationwide described worsening and increasingly severe behavioral problems in young children, students who are more disruptive, who lash out physically at classmates and teachers, and who demonstrate a more defiant nature than in previous cohorts.
In a 2025 survey, 76% of elementary school leaders said they agreed or strongly agreed that the pandemic had continued to negatively affect the behavioral development of students. The percentage of elementary schools saying they needed more training on classroom management rose from 51% in May 2022 to 65% the following year.
The need for teachers to have access to better protocols in classroom management, health & safety, and de-escalation training is a clear message we hear all the time from our clients at BitePRO®.
Recently, we spoke to a school Principal based in the US who shared her experience of being bitten by a student during a crisis de-escalation. Her story highlights how serious the issue of biting is when working with children and young adults with autism or special educational needs. It also shows the growing need for further de-escalation and physical intervention training in schools for teachers in SEND environments.
“I was assisting with a crisis de-escalation for a student with disabilities including limited verbal communication skills. The student grabbed my arm and bit me, braking skin. It didn’t affect me personally except for the tetanus shot and several days of antibiotics I underwent. However, professionally it forced me to rethink protocols and safety around de-escalation training and keeping staff and students safe. Other organizations must invest in time and training to support staff with de-escalation. I think also parents and families need supports and training to safely bring their impacted children back to calm baseline.” – Dr Alexandra Guerriero, Principal
Beyond the immediate physical harm, bite injuries carry consequences that many employers still fail to take seriously. A bite to the hand, arm, or face is not a minor workplace incident. It can result in:
For organisations that routinely dismiss bite incidents as “part of the job,” the long-term costs, in compensation claims, sick leave, recruitment, retraining, and litigation vastly outweigh the cost of prevention.
And there are legal duties at stake. Employers have a clear obligation under health and safety laws to protect employees from foreseeable risks of harm. Where bite injuries are a known and documented hazard, as they clearly are in SEND and specialist education settings, failure to take reasonable preventative steps constitutes a breach of that duty.
At BitePRO®, we believe in a layered approach to protecting staff in SEND and school environments. No single measure is sufficient on its own. Effective protection requires:
Training in de-escalation and physical intervention. Staff should understand the triggers for aggressive behavior and have the skills to respond in ways that reduce rather than escalate tension. BitePRO® Safeguarding Solutions provides specialist de-escalation and restraint training for SEND and educational settings, equipping staff with evidence-based techniques rooted in the principles of trauma-informed care.
Wearable protective equipment. When de-escalation is not possible and physical contact occurs, staff need protection. BitePRO®’s range of bite-resistant arm guards, gloves, and clothing provides a crucial layer of defence, reducing the severity of bite injuries and keeping staff safe to continue in their vital roles.
Robust incident reporting and risk assessment. Every incident of a bite injury should be recorded, investigated, and used to inform future practice. Patterns of behavior should trigger reviews of individual support plans, staffing ratios, and environmental factors.
A culture where staff feel heard. Perhaps most importantly, organisations must create environments where staff feel safe to report incidents without fear of being dismissed or blamed. When violence is normalised, reporting stops. When reporting stops, the data disappears, and with it, the organisational impetus to act.
The evidence is now overwhelming. Bite injuries and physical assaults in SEND settings and schools are rising. The pandemic has created a generation of children with heightened levels of emotional dysregulation and unmet need. Staffing shortages, resource pressures, and inadequate training have left too many professionals exposed to harm they should never have to face alone.
This is not about blame. The children in these settings need skilled, compassionate, consistent support. But they cannot receive that support from staff who are injured, traumatised, or driven out of the profession altogether.
Protecting staff is protecting children. It is time for schools, councils, and specialist providers to treat bite injuries and assault prevention not as a niche concern but as a fundamental duty of care and to invest accordingly.
If you work in a SEND setting, a special school, or any environment where bite injuries are a known risk, BitePRO® is here to help. Contact us to discuss our protective clothing range, de-escalation training programmes, or safeguarding solutions tailored to your setting.
BitePRO® is a specialist manufacturer of bite-resistant protective clothing and the provider of BitePRO® Safeguarding Solutions training, supporting professionals in SEND education, healthcare, and care environments across the UK and internationally.
