image by pixabay
A suspected outbreak of food poisoning has sent dozens of employees of TikTok's parent company, ByteDance, to the hospital in Singapore.
Sixty persons in the city state had symptoms of gastroenteritis on Tuesday; health and food safety officials are looking into the occurrence. Of them, fifty-seven received hospital treatment.Moreover, ByteDance has stated that company is investigating the reason behind its employees' illnesses.
The BBC is aware that food is provided by outside caterers and that no food is ever cooked or processed at the ByteDance offices.
According to local media sources, 17 ambulances were dispatched to the building located in Singapore's business center to tend to the sick patients.
"We take the health and safety of our employees very seriously and have taken immediate steps to support all affected employees, including working with emergency services to provide care," a spokeswoman for ByteDance told the BBC.
"We are investigating the matter and are working with the relevant authorities on this."
In a joint statement with the city-state's Ministry of Health, the Singapore Food Agency (SFA) stated that "food operators must play their part by adhering to good food safety practices".
The statement also stated that "SFA will not hesitate to take enforcement action against errant food operators."
Chinese entrepreneurs founded ByteDance in 2012, and the short video app Douyin was the company's first big hit there. It introduced TikTok, an international Douyin equivalent, a year later.
With over a billion active users worldwide, TikTok is not available in China.
While it is presently managed by a limited liability corporation with offices in Los Angeles and Singapore, ByteDance still holds the majority stake.
0 Comments