Dirk provides technical, policy and advocacy advice to the team, the latter mainly focused on how to profile NTDs in the global health and development context.

Dirk retired as Director of WHO's NTD Department at the end of 2017. He has worked for WHO for 20 years, after having spent the first half of his career in sub-Saharan Africa - working successively in Zambia, Zimbabwe, Burundi, Rwanda and Senegal as clinical tropical doctor, district medical officer, and tropical disease programme manager at the national and sub-regional level.

Dirk is a distance swimmer, a keen gardener and DIY-er, and a proud grandfather.