It should not be entirely up to the pilots, but since no politician in Europe has the leadership skills and balls required for the job, it is left up to us. Instead of sending up drones, balloons or using other test/sample equipment or boroscope examination results already available from all carriers in Europe, the politicians, as usual, chicken out. They're not even wiling to provide us with any sort of drone/test flight/ laser measurement data.
Without a plethora of committees and subcommittees to hide behind, no fall guy and no way to shift the blame, they are scared sh!tless and need human shields (pilots) outside their offices.
I have never heard of similar situations in other parts of the world, even though volcanoes erupt everywhere, all the time! That said, I have no second thoughts about flying in Zone 2 / low contamiation areas. I am more worried about bird strikes and thunderstorms, since these have brought down far more aircraft than invisible computer generated ash clouds...