www.topangaonline.com/nature/...atk.html (there are endless statistics all saying about the same thing:

For example, in California, there were two fatal attacks in 1890 and 1909, and then no further attacks for 77 years, until 1986. From 1986 through 1995, ten verified attacks occurred, an average rate of one per year. That average rate has continued through 1999. Attacks are now numerous enough that there is a support group for attack victims, called California Lion Awareness (CLAW; Outside, 10/95). Since 1970 there has been an average of 14 cougar attacks per year on people in the entire U.S.

Mountain lion sightings have increased dramatically as well, from 59 in 1991 to over 300 in 1994 in California. However, because mountain lions are camouflage experts, and eyewitness sightings are notoriously inaccurate, perhaps 80% of all lion sightings are actually deer, bobcats, dogs, and even domestic cats. Part of any increase is also surely due to the heightened awareness of lions with the increase in attacks.

The reasons for the increase are unknown. Some think the increase in California was a consequence of the end of recreational hunting of mountain lions in 1972, and then the passage of Proposition 117 in 1990, which declared the cougar a "specially protected mammal". However, it is even hard to tie the timing of the increase in attacks in California to those events, and a similar increase in attacks has occurred in other states where recreational hunting is still allowed.

It is important to keep in mind that lion attacks are still extremely rare in California and nationally. For some reason, humans worry much more about rare dangers than about common dangers. For example, in California, from 1986 through 1998, exactly two people died from mountain lion attacks, whereas in one year alone, over 4,000 people died in traffic accidents, including 800 pedestrians. So we should be much more worried about meeting a dangerous car rather than a dangerous lion, but we aren't, because we are much more familiar with being in a car than we are with being around an uncaged mountain lion. Rationally, if one avoids hiking because of fear of mountain lions, one should also avoid driving in a car, or crossing a street as a pedestrian.

Another example: an average of several people per year die from recreational activities in the San Gabriel Mountains, yet no one has ever died from a cougar attack in the San Gabriel Mountains. You are probably much more likely to die from a misstep off a trail than from a mountain lion attack. So pay attention to where you are putting your feet rather than worrying about if there is a mountain lion about to pounce on you!