Then what about driving ? By the same logic, car accidents should be much less. Flights are much safer due to the amount of research done in air-travel safety, in general, and also after every accident. And also because in roads you have too many cars interacting together at the same time, where any one person's small mistake can cause an accident, which is not the case with aeroplanes.
Yes, of course. But why? Why is the amount of safety research so much higher after a plane crashes compared to when a patient dies? Why are simple checklists common practice for pilotes but not for doctors even though they could save many lives [1].
As for car travel. It seems to be inherently more dangerous for the reasons you mention. But lets introduce a principal-agent problem [2] for car driving. Assume that for example taxi drivers would steer the vehicle from a save place say as a drone. Would you want to drive with such a taxi?
[1] Gigerenzer: Risk Savvy - How to make good decisions. [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal–agent_problem