Dr Kris De Clercq

Sciensano, Belgium
Head of Unit Vesicular and Exotic Diseases

Email:

DEFEND role: Co-lead

Kris obtained his veterinary degree from the State University of Gent, Belgium and became Master of Science in Animal Production at the same University. He worked as Product Manager in the Pharmaceutical Company ICI and joined the Virology Department of Sciensano in 1985.

His main activities are in the field of vaccine control and the development and validation of diagnostics for foot-and-mouth disease, bluetongue, lumpy skin disease and sheep and goat pox.

At Sciensano he is Head of the OIE Collaborative Centre for validation, quality assessment and quality control of diagnostic assays and vaccine testing for vesicular diseases in Europe; Head of the FAO Reference Centre for Vesicular Diseases and Head of the EU Reference Laboratory for diseases caused by capripox viruses.

He coordinated two EC Research Projects on FMD, a project for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and a GALVmed project on lumpy skin disease and is partner in several International and National research projects.

Since 2009 he is Vice-President of the OIE Scientific Commission.