AORN announced late Tuesday, that they had received many calls from nurses, exhibitors, and others regarding our Global Surgical Conference & Expo in Anaheim, novel coronavirus (COVID-19), and the intention to continue with the live-event conference. Everyone, including AORN, wants a conference that is an outstanding experience and certainly one that assures a safe environment.
AORN takes very seriously its mission to keep healthcare workers and surgical patients safe. Despite everyone's best efforts, we cannot promise a safe environment for nurses, exhibitors, vendors and staff. Therefore, consistent with our values of communication, quality, innovation and collaboration we regret to inform you, AORN Global Surgical Conference & Expo 2020 is cancelled.
Unfortunately, postponement is not an option because of the event size and the limited number of cities able to accommodate us. Neither do we anticipate a near-term solution to contain the spread of COVID-19.
We share your disappointment and sincerely thank you for your understanding of this very difficult decision.
Orange County, Florida is averaging 1,000 new coronavirus cases per day. Due to this dramatic surge, we made the difficult decision to cancel our in-person Global Surgical Conference & Expo Aug. 7-10 at the Orange County Convention Center and focus exclusively on our virtual conference.
The mayor of Orange County, Florida – where Orlando is located –declared the county is facing a COVID-19 “crisis” from the Delta variant. The positivity rate for the virus has tripled to almost 14% from 4.3% one month ago. Florida has become the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic in the U.S. with 25% of the nation’s cases.
