Jorge Alvar

Dr Jorge Alvar is medical officer in charge of the Leishmaniasis Control Programme in the Department of Neglected Tropical Diseases at the World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva. Prior to this he was the director of the National Centre of Tropical Medicine at the Institute of Health Carlos III, Madrid, Spain.

Dr Alvar comes from Granada, Spain. He graduated in Medicine and Surgery from the Complutense University of Madrid in 1979, and obtained a diploma of Tropical Medicine and Parasitology in Hamburg, Germany. Following this, he obtained his PhD in Medicine before completing a postdoctorate at Cambridge University, England.

Dr Alvar has received awards for his research into leishmaniasis epidemiology, chemotherapy and diagnosis, canine infection, and AIDS co-infection. He has participated in more than 30 research projects for various national and international research agencies, and in a number of cooperation programmes in leishmaniasis in a dozen countries in four continents with the Spanish Agency of International Cooperation for Development. Dr Alvar is a member of the editorial board of a number of different journals, and fellow of the Royal Academy of Medicine, Spain. He has co-authored numerous books and chapters on the subject of leishmaniasis and tropical medicine, and has also been involved in the production of several documentaries on malaria and leishmaniasis.

18. und 19. November 2005, Kaiserin-Friedrich-Haus, Robert-Koch-Platz 7, 10115 Berlin