People who attended Yuga Labs’ recent 3-day event for their Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT collection reported experiencing eye irritation, vision issues, and skin irritation. The symptoms arose after a brightly lit party on Saturday night at the event called ApeFest, held November 3-5 in Hong Kong.
Attendees took to social media saying they had “severe eye burn” and other problems after the party. Yuga Labs acknowledged the reports and said they are investigating alongside event vendors to identify potential causes. The company estimated that 15 people out of 2,250 attendees reported issues, which is less than 1%.
One attendee, Adrian Zduńczyk, said he was diagnosed with photokeratitis, essentially a sunburned eye, after going to the hospital. He said despite vision testing fine, he spent 6 hours at the hospital and clinic and was prescribed steroid eye drops. Another attendee, “Crypto June,” said she couldn’t see after waking up and had skin burns, with a doctor saying the UV lighting caused the issues.
Yuga Labs is known for the Bored Ape NFTs, which ignited the NFT craze in 2021. The company raised $450 million this year but recently had layoffs. Yuga said the restructuring will help better serve their community and company vision. They emphasized the layoffs were difficult decisions impacting people.
The company said they are distressed by the attendee health reports and that nothing is more important than their community’s safety. Yuga is continuing to investigate to identify what led to the issues.
