Do we need to wait for a tragedy before we do something? Good on the airlines and regulators for recognizing a burgeoning problem and taking action before (hopefully) it leads to unnecessary deaths.
Yes, absolutely. It isn't pleasant to think about, but laws and regulations are meaningless if they aren't based on actual numbers. If I wanted to propose some new feature at work, people would understandably want to see some numbers and not just “feels nice” lol