12 May 2020
To all the Officers of the Administrative Council and to all Committee Chairs,
The worldwide pandemic of COVID- 19 has impacted all of us both professionally and personally. In these unprecedented times, our usual way of doing business has been altered, possibly forever. Our mission remains the same though, and that is to raise the level of neurosurgical knowledge globally, to provide the best care to our patients all across the world.
Previously, we had decided to cancel any in person meetings through July 2020. Our hope was that the crisis would run its course and that it would be reasonable to restart our business as usual. Unfortunately the pandemic continues and there are still many areas where the infection incidence and deaths continue to rise. For that reason the Administrative Council will decide in June whether to suspend all WFNS sponsored and co-sponsored in person meetings through the rest of 2020.
As above, our mission continues and it is important that we continue to develop new educational opportunities and programs for the dissemination of Neuroscience and neurosurgical knowledge throughout the world. The leadership of the WFNS would like to encourage all of you to continue to grow our catalog of "meetings" through alternative platforms for interchange and collaboration, specifically utilizing electronic means for webinars, committee meetings, publications, conferences, etc.
These webinars and virtual Meetings will be displayed in our Web Site.
The professional societies and the committee members of the WFNS have always been creative and innovative in their approaches to neurosurgery and neurosurgical knowledge. We look forward to hearing of how all of you adjust and redirect your energies during this particularly difficult time, serving as a model for the development of new educational initiatives that will carry us beyond this crisis with new opportunities and new ways of doing things.
All of us here at the WFNS wish you stay well and stay healthy. We look forward to the day we can all meet back in person.
Sincerely,
Franco Servadei, MD President, WFNS
P. David Adelson, MD Chair, Committee Activities