November 18, 2003

To the Editor
COA Bulletin

Subject: SARS, The COA Toronto Meeting

Dear Sir:

It was and is clear in my mind that the Executive of the COA had no choice but to cancel the Annual Meeting in Toronto in 2002. To run the risk of spreading SARS to even one patient, no matter where, by a contaminated participant returning to work in his or her own milieu would have been unthinkable.

To all those people who worked so hard, first for the Toronto Meeting and then for the transfer to Winnipeg, I say “chapeaux”.

Yours sincerely,

John V. Fowles, M.D., FRCSC