any car accident is bad but them old cars were brutal. lots of steel, no crumple zone and nothing soft or anything that gives.
i know, people still died in car accidents and i have no numbers to back me up but my own experience tells me new cars are safer.
15 or 20 years ago i saw many more bad injuries and fatalities. air bags, seatbelts, crumple zones and vehicles that keep their shape in a rollover protecting the passenger compartment keep people safer. i can only guess that many of those older vehicles without safety features no longer being on the road is part of it.