Maria Kerkhove

Maria Van Kerkhove holds an honorary lecturer position at Imperial College after leaving the college in January 2015 to join the Center for Global Health at Institut Pasteur as the Head of their Outbreak Investigation Task Force.

While at Imperial College, Maria Van Kerkhove served as a senior research fellow in the MRC Centre for Outbreak Analysis and Modelling, Department of Infectious Disease Epidemiology at Imperial College London and a Technical Consultant for the Global Capacities, Alert and Response Cluster of the World Health Organization (WHO). Dr Van Kerkhove remains a technical consultant for WHO.

Dr. Van Kerkhove served as the liaison between the World Health Organization (WHO) and the MRC Centre for Outbreak Analysis and Modelling. In this role, she developed projects to support WHO activities and policy decision making for influenza, Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV), yellow fever, Ebola and other emerging diseases. She and Centre staff continue to provide technical assistance to WHO (including to the Global Influenza Programme, the Pandemic and Epidemic Diseases Department, Initiative for Vaccine Research department and the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network) through the interpretation of available global data, in collaboration with WHO’s member states, regional and country offices and internationally renowned scientists. The centre provides technical support in the areas of influenza, MERS-CoV, polio, malaria, yellow fever, cholera, hepatitis, HIV and meningitis.

Dr Van Kerkhove is also a member of the WHO Task Force for MERS-CoV. Her work involves providing WHO with epidemiologic and statistical support for the analysis and interpretation of MERS-CoV data for risk assessments, web-based summaries and communications; the development of epidemiologic and serologic investigation protocols for MERS-CoV; and other publications on topics related MERS-CoV.

During the 2009 H1N1 influenza pandemic, Dr. Van Kerkhove worked directly with WHO’s Global Alert and Response and Global Influenza Programme to support the pandemic response. Her main activity during the pandemic was to coordinate the WHO informal mathematical modelling network for H1N1pdm under the leadership of Professor Neil Ferguson and Dr. Cathy Roth (WHO), which included more than 40 Individuals from public health and academic organizations from around the world.