Why are Cougars a "Protected Species" in Washington state? Why has the state not, rather, attempted to exterminate them?

Given that cougars have killed two human beings in Washington since 1925--the more recent killing occurring just a couple of weeks ago--and on at least fifteen other occasions in that time, they have viciously attacked and injured citizens of Washington, without quite killing them.  Are two citizens' lives not worth any number of animals' lives, "Protected Species" though they may be? Stand up straight and answer the goddamned question.

And if you were thinking, with slack-jawed hesitancy, about those 50,000 citizens, more or less, of India who die yearly from cobra bites--What conclusion did you come to, Little Snowflake?

That perhaps emergency response services are somewhat deficient in the Indian subcontinent?  Yes, certainly they are. But how is it that the extermination of cobras isn't something that Indians--or you--even think about?