BIIB Biogen Inc

By Joseph Walker and Brianna Abbott 

A strategy meeting for senior managers at Boston-area biotech Biogen Inc. late last month has emerged as a hotbed for novel coronavirus infections, resulting in more than two dozen around the country so far, according to public-health and company officials.

The spread of coronavirus infections from the meeting highlights the potential dangers in going ahead with the gatherings and conferences that are a staple of conducting business but which also threaten to amplify epidemics.

"There's a lot of handshaking, there's a lot of being in close quarters, and that puts you at risk," said Manish Trivedi, the director of the division of infectious diseases at AtlantiCare in New Jersey. "You eat something. You rub your eyes. You touch your face."

Senior Biogen managers who attended the strategy meeting at the Boston Marriott Long Wharf hotel have since traveled to gatherings of investors and doctors, as well as returned to their homes in communities that are also now confronting infection risks.

Among those testing positive for the coronavirus because of the meeting is an unnamed Biogen executive now in isolation, a company spokesman said.

Massachusetts has felt the biggest impact from the Biogen meeting's role in the transmission of the virus. The state's health department said Monday that 32 patients presumed or confirmed to be infected have links to the meeting. To limit further spread, schools in the area briefly closed.

Two Indiana residents linked to the Boston meeting have been presumptively diagnosed with the infection, according to Indiana's health department. Five people who live in Wake County, N.C., which includes Raleigh, are presumed to be infected after attending the meeting, the Wake County Public Health Division said.

Washington, D.C., said a 77-year-old man who attended the Biogen meeting tested positive for the novel infection.

Palm Beach County, Fla., officials linked another presumed case to the company, saying a Biogen employee from Pennsylvania who traveled to a multiple-sclerosis conference held in West Palm Beach later tested positive for the virus.

The strategy meeting is an annual planning event at Biogen, a multinational drugmaker known for its multiple-sclerosis treatments that is headquartered in Cambridge, Mass., and counts 7,500 employees world-wide and about $14 billion in global sales.

About 175 Biogen senior managers from around the U.S. and international locations convened at the Boston Marriott Long Wharf on Feb. 26 and Feb. 27, a Biogen spokesman said. Then early last week, some attendees began reporting flulike symptoms, he said.

The company soon afterward contacted public-health authorities, the Biogen spokesman said. Those who attended the company meeting were asked to stay home and monitor symptoms for 14 days, a Massachusetts health department spokeswoman said.

A Marriott spokeswoman said it was informed of the coronavirus infections. "We are working closely with the appropriate public-health authorities and are following their guidance," she said.

The Biogen meeting's role in transmitting the virus has led health authorities, hospitals and schools to scramble to prevent further spread.

As of Monday evening, Massachusetts's health department counted a total of 41 presumed or confirmed coronavirus cases in the state. Among the area hospitals that mobilized to help detect additional cases was Massachusetts General in Boston.

At an ad hoc clinic constructed in the Massachusetts General's ambulance bay, it has been examining, since last Friday, anyone who might have been exposed as a result of the Biogen meeting, said Eileen Searle, the hospital's biothreats clinical operations program manager.

Last Friday, two public schools in Wellesley, Mass., sent students home early after being informed that a resident with children at the schools had been presumptively diagnosed with the virus after coming into close contact with a person who became ill after the Biogen meeting.

The schools reopened Monday, March 9, after officials determined the schools had been thoroughly cleaned and disinfected, according to the Town of Wellesley Health Department.

Officials in Arlington, Mass., a Boston suburb, closed an elementary school for one day on Monday, March 9, after a parent who had attended the Biogen meeting was diagnosed with the virus and a student started showing symptoms, the town health department said.

The student has since tested positive for the novel coronavirus infection, local health authorities said. Close contacts of the infected student have been asked to self-quarantine for 14 days and not go to school, according to the town health department.

Meantime, public-health authorities face the prospect that the virus has spread further as some Biogen managers who attended the company's strategy meeting then went on to other large gatherings for their work, though there haven't been any reported infections so far.

Four company executives, including Chief Executive Michel Vounatsos, attended a Boston-based health-care investor conference held by Cowen Inc. on March 2, the Biogen spokesman said.

The other Biogen executives who attended were the company's chief financial officer, Jeff Capello; Al Sandrock, executive vice president for research and development; and head of investor relations, Joe Mara.

One of the four Biogen executives at the Cowen conference subsequently tested positive for the virus, the spokesman said.

The infected executive is recovering well in isolation, and all four are performing their normal duties while working remotely, the spokesman said. The company told office-based employees to work from home starting today, though some lab staff are still working on site, he said.

A Cowen spokesman said that it notified everyone attending its conference and is following federal government guidelines, and that there haven't been any cases among Cowen employees or reports of infections from other attendees so far.

The Biogen employee who traveled to Florida was at a company booth on Feb. 28 at the annual meeting of the Americas Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis, which was held at the Palm Beach County Convention Center.

There are currently no confirmed cases in the county, local officials said.

Upon learning of the infected Biogen employee, the multiple-sclerosis group told all conference attendees so they could take precautions, Jeffrey Cohen, the committee's president, said. The group isn't aware of any additional cases, he said.

Amy Dockser Marcus contributed to this article.

Write to Joseph Walker at joseph.walker@wsj.com and Brianna Abbott at brianna.abbott@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 10, 2020 10:43 ET (14:43 GMT)

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