The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Content and Logistics of this Special Edition on Building and Leveraging Ecosystems and Clusters

Co-Editors’ Preface and Statement

Abstract

On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) Director General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus addressed the global media: “WHO has been assessing this outbreak around the clock and we are deeply concerned both by the alarming levels of spread and severity, and by the alarming levels of inaction. We have therefore made the assessment that COVID-19 can be characterized as a pandemic.”¹ While the existence, transmissibility, treatment, and potential impact of severe acute respiratory coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 were real questions since the virus was first recognized in December, 2019,² much of the media coverage was driven by global public health concerns and international/national political posturing. However, it was a different date that catalyzed commercial biotechnology.