I’m getting into welding as part of my car restoration hobby, and was thinking of doing some stainless welding for headers.

I came across warnings about hexavalent chromium and how carcinogenic it is, and how it persists in dust and on surfaces.

In all of my YouTube watching, I’ve never once seen a guy welding SS have any kind of close filtered dust collection system, and most aren’t even wearing any kind of respirator. Granted, they may be doing that because it’s easier to talk on camera without one, but that still doesn’t address that maybe their home garage is contaminated?

Is the risk overblown? Am I missing something?