Conference Format & Covid-19 Safety Concept

Conference Format

The Swiss Society of Cardiology, the Swiss Society of Cardiac Surgery and their scientific committee are confident, that the Annual Meeting can take place as planned and are making great efforts to adhere to the format of a physical meeting in St. Gallen, despite the current Covid-19 situation.

Thus, all congress components, such as scientific sessions, satellite symposia and ateliers, industry exhibition as well as social events, are planned as live events at the respective locations.
Due to the format of a physical meeting on-site in St. Gallen, a livestream of the lectures or a recording and on-demand provision of such are currently not planned.

Covid-19 Safety Concept

Following the current rules of the Federal Office of Public Health, it is no longer a requirement to wear a face-mask or to provide a valid Covid-Certificate.
Nevertheless, the committee strongly appeals to the personal responsibility of each participant and still recommends adherence to the 2G+ rule as well as the wearing of a face-mask during the conference, even if there will be no control of these measures.

All participants are kindly requested to read the following information carefully, which provides all important details about the health regulations and pre-arrangements for your physical attendance at the SSC/SSCS Annual Meeting 2022 in St. Gallen, Switzerland.

Before travelling to St. Gallen

  • If you have any COVID-19 symptoms such as fever, dry cough, headache etc. – please DO NOT travel to St. Gallen.

Entry Checks

Although the obligation for showing a Covid-Certificate has been dropped, the committee strongly recommends adherence to the initially established 2G+ rule, which is defined as follows:

2G+ = You are either fully vaccinated or recovered and can provide a valid certificate for a negative test result.

For further information on how “Fully vaccinated” is defined in Switzerland, please click here: Definition “Fully vaccinated”
For further information on how “Recovered” is defined in Switzerland, please click here: Definition “Recovered”

The committee appeals to the personal responsibility of each participant, thus there will be no entry checks at the conference center in this regard.

Covid-19 Test-Sites

There are several test-stations in the immediate vicinity of the congress centre: Test-sites in St. Gallen

Appointments & Costs

Some test stations may require the booking of an appointment. Furthermore, depending on your insurance status (holder of a Swiss insurance card or not) and the type of test you would like to take, costs may apply.
Please refer to the link of the
respective test-site for further information about booking requirements, available time slots and costs.

Validity

According to current regulations, PCR tests are valid for 72 hours and rapid antigen tests for 24 hours from issuance.
Please check in advance the available test types at the respective test-sites, as not all of them offer all types of tests. Furthermore, keep in mind that results for PCR-tests may only be available 24 hours (or even more) after your test was taken.

Click here for further information on valid Covid-19 tests.

Important Information

Please note that the above mentioned provision are based on the official regulations of the Swiss Federal Office of Public Health and as such are subject to changes. In order to stay up-to-date, please consult the conference webpage where all adaptions will be published in a timely manner.

We are looking forward to welcoming you to St. Gallen in June! Should you have any questions about COVID-19 regulations in Switzerland or any other issues, please do not hesitate to contact the Conference Secretariat: sgk@congrex.com