ESCMID has evolved remarkably over the last few years. The society is stronger and broader than ever before in the four decades since our founding. Today, our focus is to step up the fight against antimicrobial resistance, to advance preparedness for emerging infections, and to lead in the practice, education and training of specialists. We welcomed over 4000 new members in recent years and expect to see a record-breaking number of some 20,000 colleagues at our congress in Barcelona. As such, our organisation needs to adapt to this new reality.
In 2023, an in-depth analysis of our brand and communication efforts has shown that our brand did not sufficiently reflect the increasingly global role of ESCMID and that many in our community were not aware of ESCMID’s numerous activities regarding research, education and guidelines. On top of that, a large part of our audience was not aware of the connection between ECCMID and ESCMID.
As a result, we decided to strengthen our main brand, ESCMID, and bring all of our various sub-brands more closely together under one large ESCMID umbrella. This includes changing the name of our congress to “ESCMID Global”, creating an unmistakable link to ESCMID and expressing our outreach and perspective beyond Europe.
In parallel, we are modernising our visual identity. As we strive for pioneering research and state-of-the-art education, we also want to communicate in a way that is effective in our time and fit for the next decade. The first manifestation of these efforts is our renewed website escmid.org, which we have released today.
The upcoming ESCMID Global, formerly ECCMID, in Barcelona (27–30 April 2024) will be our 34th congress and the first one with the new name and look. We are very much looking forward to seeing you there!