I recently bought an old Peugeot BD-1 which seems to be in excellent condition. No cracks etc obviously. It has the non-extendable handle stem, which doesn't show any signs of cracking etc at the usual spot where they seem to break.

Snce getting it, I've been reading about them and a lot of the sites in Japan really make the thing sound like a deathtrap that could have a catastrophic failure resulting in death at any moment.
Most such sites are bike shop related and of course their solution is to buy a new bike.

It's ruining my enjoyment of the bike, since I don't really want to die in a catastrophic bicycle failure, but could someone with more knowledge let me know how much I should be concerned about this?

Is it just a case of keeping an eye out for any cracks etc before I cycle it, or are these things so fragile that I should just buy a new folding bike if I value my life?