Thanks for sharing! Agreed that I hope all future conferences have a remote option for more wide participation. It is also really helpful if you only interested in a few topics to really maximize the week. 

In case you didn't register for this conference, I am passing on some information from the organizers:

Access to Session Recordings
Were there some sessions you missed this week, or perhaps you just want to relive the experience? You can continue to watch sessions on-demand in the Conference Portal, which will remain live for the next 6 months.

Watch the recorded content here: waterandhealthconference.pathable.co/all-plenary-sessions

Next week we will also send you a link with all the session recordings in one place on our YouTube channel .

We're pleased to share some fantastic statistics with you:
• 3,439 attendees across the week
• 140 countries represented
• 195 conference sessions

I hope that all future WASH conferences (even after Covid is no longer an issue) will have a very strong online participation option, so that only people who live, say, in less than 500 km radius from the event would go there in person. Conferences could thus use a blended format. Some research will have to be done to determine the fee that online participants could be charged. Maybe it would work best if one had to pay per session for online-participation rather than the full conference fee.

Paying a fee would have the advantage that one is more likely to really set aside time for attending, rather than trying to multi-task with other things... However, it would exclude some people from participating. Perhaps the fee would have to be lower if attending from a low-income country but then the admin efforts for this might be higher. (in the review form they asked about "would you attend if the fee was $ 100?")

I think we'll all learn over time how online conferences will work best. Thanks to Covid for nudging us into a direction that we should have taken long ago, in order to reduce CO2 emissions from travelling and to allow more people to participate, independently of how far away they live...

Regards,
Elisabeth

I've never been able to attend the annual WASH conference at UNC in the United States (Water And Health Conference: Science, Policy And Practice) due to the travel distance and costs but this year, thanks to Covid, I'll be able to attend as it will be held online. So that's a positive side effect of this horrible pandemic.

Here are the details:

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2020 UNC Water And Health Conference: Science, Policy And Practice 
The UNC Water and Health Conference: Science, Policy and Practice will be held October 26 – 30, 2020 virtually from the comfort of your home or office. The conference will explore drinking water supply, sanitation, hygiene and water resources in both developing and developed countries with a strong public health/COVID-19 emphasis.



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You can register here: unc.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_eQciar5upUXcGA5

I've just registered. Might see you in the chat rooms at one of the conference sessions?

Elisabeth