AAD Annual Meeting Becomes Latest Casualty of COVID-19 Outbreak

The American Academy of Dermatology (AAD) annual meeting became the latest casualty of the COVID-19 outbreak, with the conference cancelled on Tuesday. The meeting was scheduled to be held from March 20 to 24 in Denver, CO, with the AAD indicating that it will now “explore virtual meeting options.”

George Hruza, president of the academy, noted that “over the last several days the AAD has received notices from faculty nationwide who have been put on a travel ban from their institutions. Due to the limited number of academic faculty able to present at our meeting and other related factors, we are no longer able to host the high-caliber meeting that our attendees and exhibitors have come to expect.”

The cancellation follows a similar move by the Endocrine Society, which has put a halt to its annual meeting, ENDO 2020, scheduled to be held from March 28 to 31 in San Francisco, CA. The Endocrine Society said “with an ever-increasing number of our members on the front lines of preparing and reacting to the COVID-19 outbreak worldwide, it is in the best interest of everyone to cancel the meeting.”

Meanwhile, the Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA) cancelled its annual meeting, which was set to be held from March 19 to 22 in San Antonio, TX, with the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS) also cancelling its annual conference, which was due to be held from March 24 to 28 in Orlando, FL. Further, the European Society for Radiotherapy and Oncology (ESTRO) annual conference has been postponed until July. The meeting, which takes place in Vienna, Austria, was scheduled to run from April 3 to 7.

Conferences that have been cancelled due to the COVID-19 outbreak include:

• American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI) annual meeting
• American College of Cardiology’s Scientific Session together with the World Congress of Cardiology (ACC.20/WCC)
• Acute Cardiovascular Care 2020, a scientific congress of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC)
• Annual Conference of the European Neuroendocrine Tumor Society (ENTS)
• Annual Meeting of the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry (AAGP)
• Society of Interventional Radiology (SIR) annual meeting
• European Heart Rhythm Association (EHRA) scientific congress

Conferences that will be held virtually due to the COVID-19 outbreak include:

• Cognitive Neuroscience Society (CNS) conference
• Conference On Retroviruses And Opportunistic Infections (CROI)

Conferences that have been postponed due to the COVID-19 outbreak include:

• International Symposium on Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine (ISICEM)
• Annual European Association of Urology Congress (EAU)
• European Congress of Radiology (ECR)
• National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) annual meeting
• World Congress on Osteoporosis, Osteoarthritis and Musculoskeletal Diseases (WCO-IOF-ESCEO)
• Annual Meeting of the Society of Surgical Oncology (SSO)