By: Benjamin Liew

A week of investigations later, we are still no clearer about the cause behind 21 volunteers of the Singapore Youth Olympic Games Organising Committee (SYOGOC) developing food poisoning on Aug 15.

This is in contrast to the 3 days it took the National Environment Agency (NEA) to root out the causative agent in the notorious Indian rojak [Indian salad] food poisoning incident that occurred at a Geylang Serai eatery last year.

Prior to the Youth Olympic Games (YOG), this same agency had imposed stringent hygiene standards on food caterers who were contracted to the YOG.

Although all 21 volunteers at the Singapore Indoor Stadium and East Coast Park venues have since recovered, and there were thankfully no fatalities unlike in Geylang, the lapse in hygiene and slow response to the incident has raised some questions.

Not only has the cause not been uncovered, even the caterer responsible for this lapse in hygiene hasn’t been identified in more than a week.

In an interview with Channel News Asia, Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports Vivian Balakrishnan said, “I have made it a point every day to have my meal with the volunteers so that’s my way of ensuring quality control… In a massive operation like this, from time to time, problems will arise.”

While this has been reassuring, of greater concern, especially among parents of volunteers, appears to be the delay in which the news was released. The public only learnt of the incident 3 days after it had occurred. The fear is that more people could have been unknowingly exposed to tainted food in that time.

Linda Wang, 43, a housewife whose how two children aged nine and ten had eaten the catered food at one of the YOG events, told UrbanWire that had the news been broken to the public earlier, her children could have packed their own food instead of eating what was provided at the YOG. This would then allow them to avoid risking food poisoning altogether.

Although every event, especially one of the scale of the YOG will have its fair share of controversies and accidents, some are wondering if more couldn’t have been done to protect the welfare of the 20,000 plus YOG volunteers who have done a great deal to ensure the games go on smoothly.