March 16, 2020

A letter from Robert Pacifici PhD, Chief Scientific Officer, CHDI, to our collaborators about working practices during the pandemic

Dear CHDI Collaborator:

The current coronavirus pandemic is affecting all of us in very unwelcomed and uncertain ways. First and foremost, I’m reaching out to you on behalf of all of us at CHDI to express our sincere wishes that you, your colleagues and institution, and your families are coping with the circumstances as best you can.

CHDI’s mission and your efforts are too important to the people with HD and their families to be stopped by the coronavirus. CHDI will not be ‘closed’. At the same time, the health and safety of everyone at CHDI and their families is of paramount importance, therefore each person at CHDI will keep working as usual but will do so in a way that creates as much ‘social distance’ from others as possible. Additionally, we have suspended all non-essential travel and will not be hosting visitors at any of our offices.

I am sure many of you and your institutions will be making similar difficult but necessary decisions, and we recognize that a certain degree of disruption in the workplace is inevitable. I would respectfully ask that you keep your regular contact at CHDI (your JSC member, Science Director, and/or Program Manager) apprised of your situation, particularly as it impacts the work you are doing on CHDI’s behalf.

It is inevitable that some institutions and companies will implement policies that will make it difficult or even impossible for aspects of your work to continue. Please develop contingency plans for your CHDI research right away. This includes whatever measures you can safely implement now to preserve and store precious stocks of animals, cell cultures and other labile reagents in order to preserve the continuity and integrity of our efforts going forward. If you anticipate any difficulties in this regard, please let me know right away.

Thank you in advance for your efforts and I wish you well.

Robert Pacifici, Ph.D.