Hafnarfjordur Iceland, December 20th.2020.
Dear friends.
Do you remember the presidential message from March this year, where we announced that the new date for our EOA Conference would be in April 2021? It became obvious very soon that this date could not be kept. So in a new message from June 2020 the EOA-EC asked EOA members which new time for the conference they would prefer in 2021: spring or autumn. And the majority chose the later possibility: autumn 2021. Following your opinion the EOA-EC and our partner in Italy, FAIS, have chosen a new date, starting in the evening of Wednesday the 27th of October and ending Saturday the 30th 2021. Hopefully WE WILL ALL BE THERE!
But next year will also witness another big event happening. World Ostomy Day (WOD) will be celebrated on the first Saturday in October and this time it was the responsibility of the EOA-EC to choose the motto. We have chosen „Ostomates rights are human rights – anytime and anywhere“. The reasoning for this motto is enclosed in a special letter, both in this mail and on the EOA website. Some other information will follow in time. I hope that you all like this motto and we all need to start working on WOD celebrations as soon as possible – and surely every member association will have many ideas to realize the motto in its country. We hope for interesting reports.
Christmas is almost here and of course we look forward to it as usual. However, it is not the good old version of Xmas that we are expecting, this time it will be very different. But hopefully it will still be joyful, with our closest family tight to us, our best friends on computer parties with us (perhaps we can find a way to clink our glasses together on the screen) and the virus that has been plaguing us as far away as possible. Let´s enjoy the food, the drinks, the company of the people around us and the presents, but please be careful.
All of us on the EOA-EC sincerely hope that you all can have a merry and peaceful Christmas and that we all manage to stay safe until we have won this battle with Covid19.
Best wishes from Iceland,
Jon Thorkelsson