Major participants of the the world’s largest gaming events, Game Developers Conference 2020 (GDC 2020), have bowed out citing coronavirus concerns.

The participants include Microsoft, Facebook, Epic Games, Sony and Unity.

The conference will held in San Francisco from March 16-20.

The COVID-19 outbreak which has claimed over 2700 lives with more than 78000 cases worldwide has led to major companies skipping public events for safety concerns as well as event cancellations.

Earlier this month, GSMA, the organisers of the world’s largest mobile industry exhibition, the Mobile World Congress 2020 had announced the cancellation of the event which was to be held in Barcelona after more than 30 major exhibitors including Amazon, Facebook, Sony, Nvidia, LG, Ericsson, etc. pulled out of the event.

Gaming giant Activision Blizzard, for instance, had moved its global e-gaming matches from China to Korea. The rising number of coronavirus cases in Korea had led to the cancellation of the overall event in Korea as well including the make-up matches which were moved from China.

Facebook on Friday announced the cancellation of its developer’s conference F8 which was to be held in San Francisco in May citing health concerns.

The San Francisco Mayor London Breed declared a state of emergency on Tuesday. US health officials on Wednesday confirmed a new case of coronavirus infection in northern California with the patient having no travel history to any impacted area indicating that the virus is spreading in an American community as per media reports.

The GDC 2020 event is moving forward as planned as of now with authorities working to ensure public safety, The Verge reported.

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