WHO are we?
Created in 2024, the European Q Fever Committee is a multidisciplinary group chaired by Professor Raphael Guatteo and Professor George Valiakos. Bringing together experts from various fields, the committee fosters collaboration among veterinarians, farmers, healthcare professionals, and relevant organizations to enhance knowledge and response strategies to control Q Fever across Europe.
Our MISSION
Our mission is to contribute to the fight against Q Fever in Europe by promoting science-based, harmonized recommendations for diagnosis, control, and prevention. Given its significant impact on animal health, farm productivity, and public health, we aim to facilitate knowledge-sharing and support informed decision-making among all stakeholders involved in managing the disease.
COMMITTEE
Members
GREECE . CO-CHAIR
George is Associate Professor of Bacteriology and Bacterial Diseases of Animals at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Thessaly (Greece). His PhD dealt with novel molecular diagnostic technologies (at VLA-Weybridge, UK), and he is presently involved in 13 National and European Research Projects, being Principal Investigator in five of them. He co-authored 50 publications in peer-reviewed journals. The first one that dealt with Q fever (epidemiology) was published in 2016. He has a sustained interest in descriptive epidemiology and surveillance of the disease in small ruminants. He co-chairs the European Q fever Committee, in charge of its small ruminant matters.
FRANCE . CO-CHAIR
Raphaël is full professor in ruminants health management at Oniris (Nantes, France). Besides teaching individual and population medicine and welfare, he’s conducting research in epidemiology of infectious and production diseases in cattle. His PhD was on the epidemiology of Q fever in 2006, and that disease remained one of his core research activities. His expertise is being solicited by the French Food Safety Agency (Anses), the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and regulatory bodies. He is past president of the European College of Bovine Health Managment and is currently Vice-President of the European Board of Veterinary Specialisation. He co-authored more than 60 peer-reviewed publications, and has headed the French Q fever committee over the last 4 years. He co-chairs the European Q fever Committee, in charge of its bovine matters.
FRANCE . SECRETARY
Vincent Dedet founded Auzaide Santé Animale in 1998, in France. His company provides services in scientific communication, scientific outreach and bibliographic awareness, mainly in animal health and veterinary public health. A veterinarian by training, Vincent is also a digital publisher of several newsletters (in French) for practitioners and decision-makers in animal productions. He also developed an expertise in the scientific scouting of alternative proteins. With his microbiology and epidemiology background, he also closely monitors the emergence and re-emergence of infectious diseases (e.g. BSE, BTV-8, Q fever, H5N1).
ITALY
Alda is the coordinator of three diagnostic laboratories (serology, virology, diagnostic microbiology of mammals) at the Instituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale delle Venezie Legnaro (Italy). She holds a Master degree and a PhD, and has developed an expertise in monitoring programs, diagnostic and research activity. She has co-authored several scientific publications on the development of diagnostic tools regarding abortive pathogens of ruminants, among which Coxiella burnetii.
SPAIN
Ángel is presently principal investigator of the “Microbiological Agents Associated With Animal Reproduction (ProVaginBIO) Research Group”, at the CEU Cardenal Herrera University of Valencia (Spain). With his group, he focuses on diseases with reproductive impact in ruminants such as mycoplasmosis, listeriosis or Q fever. His line of research seeks to develop and improve alternative strategies to antibiotics, such as the use of probiotics and improved diagnosis and prophylactic measures. Being a DVM and a PhD from a small ruminant family, he has experienced Q-fever from the patient point of view. Two of the PhD thesis he supervises deal with Coxiella burnetii, and although he developed three years of experience in sheep and goat clinical outbreaks, Ángel still considers Q fever an emerging line of research. They recently published a scoping review on controlling Coxiella burnetii in domestic ruminants and public health implications (Toledo et al., 2024).
SPAIN
Daniel is presently Medical Intern Resident of Public Health at the Spanish Public Health School at Instituto de Salud Carlos III (Madrid). His Master thesis focused on the epidemiology and determinants of Q fever in Spain (2016-2020), with a One Health perspective and he is a PhD candidate. He co-authored several scientific and informative publications of human Q fever. He is part of the Spanish National Centre of Epidemiology in human Q fever surveillance and appreciates to be part of a multidisciplinary group of specialists such as the European Committee on Q Fever.
UNITED KINGDOM
Jonathan is a British large animal practitioner and a registered specialist in cattle health. He is Chief Executive at RAFT Solutions Ltd and Chair & Partner in Bishopton Veterinary Group. He also is co-author of The Dairy Herd Health textbook and Professor of Sustainable Livestock Health & Welfare at Harper Keele Vet School (one of the most recently founded vet schools in the UK). He also is Chair of the Animal Health & Welfare Board for England. He is deeply involved in knowledge exchange, and outreach activities both to vets and farmers, delivering more than 100 presentations in the last 10 years. He also takes part in several research programs, including on diagnostics, genomics & precision phenotyping cattle resilience and efficiency; receiving grants from EU Horizon 20:20, Innovate UK, BBSRC and Agritech grants. On Q Fever, he led the RAFT Q Fever survey work in 2021 and reported in several veterinary journals (UK Vet Livestock and The Veterinary Times in 2023) and is part of ongoing research into the reproductive impacts of Q fever in cattle.
BELGIUM
Laurent spent 4 years as a cattle practitioner before joining in 2010 ARSIA, the Regional Association for Animal Registration and Health, a Belgian non-profit organization that supports breeders in fulfilling their obligations and needs in terms of animal health. He is the project manager of the ‘abortion protocol’ since 2010 in order to improve the diagnostics and he provides advice both in terms of the interpretation of laboratory analyses and in terms of the control measures to be implemented according to the identified abortive pathogens. He is currently completing his doctoral thesis on the monitoring of brucellosis via the bovine abortions in southern Belgium. He also is the Manager of the health administration service of ARSIA, and has 14 years of experience in diagnosing Q fever and providing advice to breeders and veterinarians.
NETHERLANDS
Piet graduated from Utrecht University (Netherlands) in 1980. He started as a large animal practitioner, then joined Royal GD. In 1996, he completed his PhD on cobalt/vitamin B12 deficiency in lambs. Since 1997, he is registered as Specialist in Small Ruminant Health Care, and since 2008, he is a Diplomate of the European College of Small Ruminant Health Management. Piet was head of the Department of Small Ruminant Health at Royal GD, Deventer, the Netherlands, until his pre-retirement in May 2020. He is still active from his own consultancy organization, Rispinge. His interests are in crisis management of outbreaks of infectious diseases, and in planned small ruminant health and production. He has been member of the Q fever (2007-2010) Outbreak Management Team and member of the expert team Q fever, Schmallenberg virus, and Chlamydia abortus and took his part in previous animal health crisis (FMD, BTV…). Piet has published over hundred papers in scientific journals, and has given presentations on small ruminant health all over the world. He is also (co)author of reference books on sheep health, both in Dutch and in English.
Sławomir Koźmiński
POLAND
Sławomir graduated from the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine at the Agricultural Academy in Wroclaw (with honors) in 2004, and then completed specialization studies in animal reproduction. His veterinary activities, in his own practice since 2004, are based on the care of dairy and beef cattle herds. The main areas of activity are veterinary advice, animal reproduction, prevention and control of infectious diseases, organization and prevention of udder diseases in dairy cows, organization and monitoring of critical control breeding points, and supervision of rearing of youngsters. He is cofounder and member of the group of veterinarians Bovi Vet Service, which takes care of more than 150,000 animals, mainly in Poland. He also is cofounder and member of the association “Veterinary Breeders” which brings together the best cow breeders in Poland. He authored a large number of lay articles and field experiences.
Thomas Wittek
AUSTRIA
Thomas is presently Professor, head of the Clinical Centre for Ruminants and Camels, at the Veterinary Faculty of Vienna, Austria. He graduated from the Leipzig University (Germany) and worked as a clinician and researcher in Germany, in the UK and in the USA. He is a Diplomate of the European College of Bovine Health Management and he is a member of the executive committee of the World Buiatrics Association. His areas of interst in Ruminants are gastro-intestinal, metabolic and infectious diseases, and he took part in research projects on salmonellosis and coxielliosis. He co-authored over 180 peer-reviewed publications, has also contributed to several books on large animal health, and is the author of numerous oral and poster presentations at scientific meetings.
GREECE . CO-CHAIR
George is Associate Professor of Bacteriology and Bacterial Diseases of Animals at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Thessaly (Greece). His PhD dealt with novel molecular diagnostic technologies (at VLA-Weybridge, UK), and he is presently involved in 13 National and European Research Projects, being Principal Investigator in five of them. He co-authored 50 publications in peer-reviewed journals. The first one that dealt with Q fever (epidemiology) was published in 2016. He has a sustained interest in descriptive epidemiology and surveillance of the disease in small ruminants. He co-chairs the European Q fever Committee, in charge of its small ruminant matters.
FRANCE . CO-CHAIR
Raphaël is full professor in ruminants health management at Oniris (Nantes, France). Besides teaching individual and population medicine and welfare, he’s conducting research in epidemiology of infectious and production diseases in cattle. His PhD was on the epidemiology of Q fever in 2006, and that disease remained one of his core research activities. His expertise is being solicited by the French Food Safety Agency (Anses), the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and regulatory bodies. He is past president of the European College of Bovine Health Managment and is currently Vice-President of the European Board of Veterinary Specialisation. He co-authored more than 60 peer-reviewed publications, and has headed the French Q fever committee over the last 4 years. He co-chairs the European Q fever Committee, in charge of its bovine matters.
FRANCE . SECRETARY
Vincent Dedet founded Auzaide Santé Animale in 1998, in France. His company provides services in scientific communication, scientific outreach and bibliographic awareness, mainly in animal health and veterinary public health. A veterinarian by training, Vincent is also a digital publisher of several newsletters (in French) for practitioners and decision-makers in animal productions. He also developed an expertise in the scientific scouting of alternative proteins. With his microbiology and epidemiology background, he also closely monitors the emergence and re-emergence of infectious diseases (e.g. BSE, BTV-8, Q fever, H5N1).
ITALY
Alda is the coordinator of three diagnostic laboratories (serology, virology, diagnostic microbiology of mammals) at the Instituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale delle Venezie Legnaro (Italy). She holds a Master degree and a PhD, and has developed an expertise in monitoring programs, diagnostic and research activity. She has co-authored several scientific publications on the development of diagnostic tools regarding abortive pathogens of ruminants, among which Coxiella burnetii.
SPAIN
Ángel is presently principal investigator of the “Microbiological Agents Associated With Animal Reproduction (ProVaginBIO) Research Group”, at the CEU Cardenal Herrera University of Valencia (Spain). With his group, he focuses on diseases with reproductive impact in ruminants such as mycoplasmosis, listeriosis or Q fever. His line of research seeks to develop and improve alternative strategies to antibiotics, such as the use of probiotics and improved diagnosis and prophylactic measures. Being a DVM and a PhD from a small ruminant family, he has experienced Q-fever from the patient point of view. Two of the PhD thesis he supervises deal with Coxiella burnetii, and although he developed three years of experience in sheep and goat clinical outbreaks, Ángel still considers Q fever an emerging line of research. They recently published a scoping review on controlling Coxiella burnetii in domestic ruminants and public health implications (Toledo et al., 2024).
SPAIN
Daniel is presently Medical Intern Resident of Public Health at the Spanish Public Health School at Instituto de Salud Carlos III (Madrid). His Master thesis focused on the epidemiology and determinants of Q fever in Spain (2016-2020), with a One Health perspective and he is a PhD candidate. He co-authored several scientific and informative publications of human Q fever. He is part of the Spanish National Centre of Epidemiology in human Q fever surveillance and appreciates to be part of a multidisciplinary group of specialists such as the European Committee on Q Fever.
UNITED KINGDOM
Jonathan is a British large animal practitioner and a registered specialist in cattle health. He is Chief Executive at RAFT Solutions Ltd and Chair & Partner in Bishopton Veterinary Group. He also is co-author of The Dairy Herd Health textbook and Professor of Sustainable Livestock Health & Welfare at Harper Keele Vet School (one of the most recently founded vet schools in the UK). He also is Chair of the Animal Health & Welfare Board for England. He is deeply involved in knowledge exchange, and outreach activities both to vets and farmers, delivering more than 100 presentations in the last 10 years. He also takes part in several research programs, including on diagnostics, genomics & precision phenotyping cattle resilience and efficiency; receiving grants from EU Horizon 20:20, Innovate UK, BBSRC and Agritech grants. On Q Fever, he led the RAFT Q Fever survey work in 2021 and reported in several veterinary journals (UK Vet Livestock and The Veterinary Times in 2023) and is part of ongoing research into the reproductive impacts of Q fever in cattle.
BELGIUM
Laurent spent 4 years as a cattle practitioner before joining in 2010 ARSIA, the Regional Association for Animal Registration and Health, a Belgian non-profit organization that supports breeders in fulfilling their obligations and needs in terms of animal health. He is the project manager of the ‘abortion protocol’ since 2010 in order to improve the diagnostics and he provides advice both in terms of the interpretation of laboratory analyses and in terms of the control measures to be implemented according to the identified abortive pathogens. He is currently completing his doctoral thesis on the monitoring of brucellosis via the bovine abortions in southern Belgium. He also is the Manager of the health administration service of ARSIA, and has 14 years of experience in diagnosing Q fever and providing advice to breeders and veterinarians.
NETHERLANDS
Piet graduated from Utrecht University (Netherlands) in 1980. He started as a large animal practitioner, then joined Royal GD. In 1996, he completed his PhD on lamb nutrition. Since 1997, he is registered as Specialist in Small Ruminant Health Care, and since 2008, he is a Diplomate of the European College of Small Ruminant Health Management. Piet was head of the Department of Small Ruminant Health at Royal GD, Deventer, the Netherlands, until his pre-retirement in May 2020. He is still active from his own consultancy organization, Rispinge. His interests are in crisis management of outbreaks of infectious diseases, and in planned small ruminant health and production. He has been member of the Q fever (2007-2010) Outbreak Management Team and member of the expert team Q fever, Schmallenberg virus, and Chlamydia abortus and took his part in previous animal health crisis (FMD, BTV…). Piet has published over hundred papers in scientific journals, and has given presentations on small ruminant health all over the world. He is also (co—author of several reference books on heep health, both in Dutch and in English.
Sławomir Koźmiński
POLAND
Sławomir graduated from the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine at the Agricultural Academy in Wroclaw (with honors) in 2004, and then completed specialization studies in animal reproduction. His veterinary activities, in his own practice since 2004, are based on the care of dairy and beef cattle herds. The main areas of activity are veterinary advice, animal reproduction, prevention and control of infectious diseases, organization and prevention of udder diseases in dairy cows, organization and monitoring of critical control breeding points, and supervision of rearing of youngsters. He is cofounder and member of the group of veterinarians Bovi Vet Service, which takes care of more than 150,000 animals, mainly in Poland. He also is cofounder and member of the association “Veterinary Breeders” which brings together the best cow breeders in Poland. He authored a large number of lay articles and field experiences.
Thomas Wittek
AUSTRIA