An Post has shared that workers have suffered very significant injuries and some postal workers needed stitches and significant time off.

An Post has revealed the counties that have seen the most attacks by pets on postal workers in Ireland, with Dublin coming up with the highest number so far this year.

Dublin has had 47 incidents resulting in 101 working days lost, with 118 incidents overall in Ireland so far in 2026.

This marks a 19% increase year-on-year, with only 99 incidents recorded in the same time period in 2025.

Cork, Kildare, Limerick and Meath round out the top five with Dublin for the highest number of attacks on Irish postal workers.

Only four counties had no recorded attacks; Leitrim, Longford, Westmeath and Cavan.

Speaking on Newstalk Breakfast, Noel Lacey, Head of Group Safety for An Post, shared that there are measures in place to help staff in situations with animals, and if they don't feel safe to make a delivery, they can put their safety first.

He explained: "Unfortunately, dog attacks are widespread, and within that bundle of incidents, unfortunately, we have a few of our colleagues that suffer quite significant injuries, including requiring stitches and in some cases, hospitalisation.

"Our main mitigation measures are empowering our colleagues to make the choice for themselves if they feel that they're in danger.

"In any instance, we empower and support our colleagues in the first case to withdraw.

"It's very hard for a single postman or woman to control the environment where a dog may roam. So that causes complications.

"However, we always support our colleagues, not to affect that delivery if they feel they may be in danger."

He also highlighted that some postmen and women have little treats in their pockets, and some dogs wait for them to come up the drive or to meet them at the gate. 

However, he emphasised that a dog who happily wagged its tail at them one day, could be not so waggy the next.

He continued: "Dogs would be in the high 90% of our animal attacks in general. But we would have pigeons, seagulls, bees and wasp stings, spiders and insects and a couple of cat scratches in there for good measure.

"All, of course, would be on the very lower scale of injury to our colleagues, but we do capture it for data purposes."

Main image: An An Post postman is seen collecting letters from a post box in Killarney, Co Kerry. Picture by: Ognyan Trifonov / Alamy Stock Photo