International Council Members

ISID COUNCIL MEMBERS

African Region

Tayo Bablobi
Nigeria

Henry Mwandumba
Malawi

Armel Tedjou Nouboudem
Cameroon

Robert Shey
Cameroon

Ernest Tambo
Cameroon

Belay Tessema
Ethiopia

Zegeye Hailemariam Tessema
Ethiopia

Chinyere Nneka Ukaga
Nigeria

Sean Wasserman
South Africa/UK

Eastern Mediterranean Region

Rashad Abdul-Ghani
Yemen

Hakan Leblebicioglu
Turkey

Nada Melhem
Lebanon

Mohamed Rhajaoui
Morocco

Nir Rudoler
Israel

Maysaa Abdallah Saeed
Egypt

European Region

Paolo Calistri
Italy

Robert Colebunders
Belgium

Botond Lakatos
Hungary

Michal Ordak
Poland

Nicola Petrosillo
Italy

Alessandra Scagliarini
Italy

Chadia Wannous
Sweden

Region of the Americas

Ahmed Aboushady
USA

Chad Cross
USA

Devika Dixit
Canada

Tatiana Drummond
Venezuela

Laura Gillim
USA

Louisa Messenger
USA

José Moreira
Brazil

Alfonso J. Rodríguez-Morales
Colombia

Southeast Asia Region

Waqas Ahmad
Pakistan

Elizabeth Ashley
Lao PDR

Rijal Basista
Nepal

Ashutosh Biswas
India

Dominicus Husada
Indonesia

Lilani Karunanayake
Sri Lanka

Fingani Mphande
Thailand

Akshatha Ravindra
India

Sadia Shakoor
Pakistan

George Varghese
India

Western Pacific Region

Nadia Atiya
Malaysia

Doo Ryeon Chung
South Korea

Kerushini Govender
New Zealand

Margaret Ip
Hong Kong

David Lewis
Australia

Xiang Ren
China

Michael Richards
Australia

Rukumani Devi Velayuthan
Malaysia

Dr Lilani Karunanayake is a Consultant Clinical Microbiologist in the Medical Research Institute, which is Sri Lanka’s apex National Reference Laboratory complex. She is the Head of the Department of Bacteriology and leads the National Reference Laboratories in clinical microbiology & molecular biology, antimicrobial resistance surveillance, leptospirosis, and the quality control laboratory which is the Proficiency Testing Provider (PTP) for clinical microbiology laboratories islandwide. She is the proficiency testing coordinator and technical advisor for the National External Quality Assessment Scheme (NEQAS) in clinical microbiology. Her laboratory provides special and reference clinical microbiology tests for the country. Further, she also provides clinical services such as advice on infection prevention & control and investigation of hospital outbreaks.

She serves in several national advisory committees in the Ministry of Health, Sri Lanka, such as National Advisory committees on antimicrobial resistance, biosafety and biosecurity, infection prevention & control etc. She is a member of the ‘Sri Lanka College of Microbiologists’, ‘Ceylon College of Physicians’ and ‘Sri Lanka Medical Association’.

She obtained MBBS from the North Colombo Medical College, and MD (Medical Microbiology) from the Postgraduate Institute of Medicine of the University of Colombo, Sri Lanka. She also trained in medical microbiology at the Royal Liverpool University Hospital, UK. Her further training includes, antibiotic stewardship from National Centre for Infectious Diseases, Singapore; biosafety preparedness to handle infectious material from National Institute of Virology, Pune, India; antimicrobial consumption methodology from WHO, Geneva Switzerland; laboratory diagnosis for leptospirosis at WHO CC, Andaman Island, India; and laboratory training courses in ISO 15189 and 17043. She pioneered and obtained ISO 15189 and ISO 17043 for all microbiology and molecular biology investigations in her laboratory and the NEQAS program respectively.

She is also a postgraduate trainer, teacher and examiner for Diploma and MD programmes, and thesis supervisor and examiner for MPhil and PhD programs both nationally and internationally.

Her research interests are in antimicrobial resistance, leptospirosis, and vaccine-preventable bacterial diseases. She has contributed to many peer-reviewed publications, including in the Antimicrobial Resistance and Infection Control journals, PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases, International Journal of Infectious Diseases, Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy. She also has over 100 peer-reviewed conference presentations. On several occasions, she has won ‘President’s Award for Scientific Publications’, the highest for research in Sri Lanka. She has contributed to several books and delivered invited speeches both nationally and internationally.