Globally, some three-quarters of all emerging zoonoses originally come from wild animals. Netherlands Centre of One Health organises a webinar to gain more expert insight in zoonosis and the jump from animals to humans.

The world is now more vulnerable to outbreaks of zoonotic disease than it used to be, firstly because people travel far and frequently, transport of animals is rising and infections can thus spread quickly. In this webinar scientists whose expertise is in zoonoses will give the latest update on their research.

Date & time: 2 September 2021, 3 pm – 4.30 pm (CEST)
Location: Zoom (you will receive a link prior to the webinar)

Register now

Our experts are

• Dr. Fabian Leendertz is leading the group “Epidemiology of Highly Pathogenic Microorganisms” at the Leendertz lab, part of the Robert Koch-Institute in Germany. From 1 August 2021 he will lead the new Helmholtz-Institute for One Health (HIOH) in Greifswald and take up the position of University professor One Health at Greifswald University. He will be addressing ‘Hotspots for disease emergence – Field & Ecology’.
• Dr. Lia van der Hoek (Amsterdam University Medical Center, location AMC) is a virologist who did her PhD in the HIV field, and switched to virus discovery in 2001 with the development of a new method to detect novel viruses. In 2003, using this technique she was the first to discover the endemic human coronavirus NL63, that had remained unrecognized till then. It soon became clear that HCoV-NL63 had spread worldwide with continuous reinfections throughout life, and the average age of first infection being around the first years of life. Besides the more than 30 research papers on HCoV-NL63 and the other endemic human coronaviruses, Lia van der Hoek has found several other previously unknown human and animal viruses. In the NCOH webinar Lia van der Hoek will talk about the technique currently in use in her group to detect novel viruses, and the necessity to link virus infection to disease.
• Arthur Edridge (Amsterdam UMC) is a medical doctor and currently conducting his PhD in medical microbiology and paediatrics on the topic of Unknown causes of encephalopathy in children in developing countries. He will talk about finding novel viruses – Encephalopathy in children in Uganda.
• Prof. dr. Chantal Bleeker-Rovers is trained as an internist-infectionologist at Radboudmc. She conducts clinical and translational research in the field of infectious diseases that present themselves in the form of outbreaks with a major social impact. She specializes in Q fever and founded the Q fever Expertise Center at Radboudumc. In particular, she studies the immunological backgrounds and the long-term effects of this condition. As a professor, she focuses her research on zoonoses that, as in the case of Q fever and COVID-19, often present themselves as outbreaks.

Moderator

The moderator of the webinar will be Maarten Hoek, Communications manager NCOH.

More information about zoonosis

Zoonoses – wur.nl.