Dr Annelies Wilder-Smith is Full Professor with Tenure for Infectious Diseases Research at Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine. Her general interests and expertise include vaccinology, travel and tropical medicine, and global health and community medicine. Over the past 15 years, she has been “Trainer of Trainers” for “Community Health Evangelism” with CHE projects in India, Cambodia, and Indonesia.
As a scientist, she has led or co-led various clinical trials, in particular vaccine trials for the development of dengue and influenza vaccines. Her recent interest is to set up a controlled human infection platform in Singapore (CHIPS). Furthermore, she is the Lead Principal Investigator and Coordinator of a large international research consortium on dengue, funded by the European Commission: www.denguetools.net Her publications include more than 170 scientific papers in international peer reviewed journals, including the New England Journal of Medicine, the Lancet, Emerging Infectious Diseases Journal and Clinical Infectious Diseases Journal. She co-edited the book “Manual of Travel Medicine & Health” and “Travel Medicine: tales behind the science” and authored the book “How to take a medical history in Chinese”. During her time in China, she met Dr Tami Fisk who served amongst the Yi tribe in West China. Tami unfortunately developed cancer and subsequently died. Her faith, sense of humor despite difficult circumstances, and “Martian” stories from the Yi tribes led Annelies and her husband to write the book “Grasping Heaven” – a story about Tami Fisk. Annelies Wilder-Smith is the President of the International Society of Travel Medicine, Past-President of the Asia Pacific Society of Travel Medicine, and was Chair of the Regional Conference of the ISTM in Singapore 2012. Since 2006, she has served as co-editor of the annual revisions of WHO’s “International Travel and Health”, was member of the WHO Working Group on yellow fever risk assessment. Professor Wilder Smith obtained her MD from the University of Heidelberg, Germany, in 1987, her Master in International Health from Curtin University in Australia, and her PhD from the University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands, in 2003. The topic of her PhD was on “W135 meningococcal disease in Hajj pilgrims”. Over the past 15 years she has developed and taught courses in global health, communicable diseases and travel-and tropical medicine both in Singapore and beyond. She worked in the Asia Pacific region for more than 20 years (China, Nepal, Papua New Guinea and since 1998 in Singapore). Inbetween she worked for WHO (2006-2007) and as Director of the Master Programme in International Health at the Institute of Public Health, University of Heidelberg, Germany (2011-2012). Professor Wilder-Smith also holds an adjunct professorship at the University of Heidelberg, Germany, and a guest professorship at the University of Umea, Sweden. She serves on the editorial board for the Journal of Travel Medicine, is Advisor to GeoSentinel, Editorial Consultant to the Lancet, and also serves as volunteer consultant to various community development projects in Asia. |