Humans are really bad at assessing risk. Parents are more likely to be afraid of a stranger kidnapping their child when their child is far more likely to die on the car ride to school.
Which is sad when you think about how suburbs are designed to make people feel safe even though their road designs tend to be extremely dangerous.
Then I remember back not long ago when seat belt laws came into effect in the US. Before then? Meh. And car seats for 6 year olds?
There are no such provisions in most of the US.
Not necessarily. Your risk of being in a fatal car accident is nearly 3x higher on suburban roads than urban roads.
This is a good video on the deficiencies of suburbia road design if you're curious: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORzNZUeUHAM
Evolution has wired us to be constantly looking for risk. If we don't find danger, we'll invent it.
As we remove the riskiest risks, the bar on what we're willing to spend and sacrifice to address the next level of risks goes higher and higher.
Then there's the press which lives by sensationalizing every bad thing that happens, leading us to grossly exaggerate risk levels in our society.