Every year, 100 million sharks are killed by people
I understand why people get freaked out by shark attacks, its not comfortable thinking of being something else's food.
But the people freaking out over such are in the same category as those who drive long distances rather than fly solely due to the fear of a crash, in spite of the drive being notably more dangerous.
I feel the media has a lot to do with this as well. I remember a few years ago it seemed like they were showing a shark attack every few days that happened. It sounded like if you went to the beach there was a shark waiting for you. Research later showed that there were no more shark attacks than normal. They just received a lot more coverage due to slow news for the most part that summer.