Lung expert Prof Karagiannidis from UW/H advises the German government on corona measures

Prof Dr Christian Karagiannidis was appointed to a newly created 19-member expert panel at the Federal Chancellery on 14 December. The 48-year-old is a specialist in internal medicine, pneumology and intensive care medicine and was appointed to the first professorship for extracorporeal lung replacement therapy at Witten/Herdecke University (UW/H) in 2016. He heads the ARDS and ECMO Centre of the Lung Clinic at the Cologne Merheim Medical Centre, which is part of the university.

He has also been President of the German Society for Internal Intensive Care Medicine and Emergency Medicine (DGIIN) since 2020 and is the medical-scientific director of the DIVI Intensive Care Register, a real-time data collection and analysis environment for intensive care bed capacities and aggregated case numbers for Germany. "The body of experts advises the German government on the latest scientific findings on the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus and develops recommendations for managing the pandemic on this basis. In addition to medical and ethical issues, the consequences of pandemic management measures in particular must also be taken into account," the German government announced in a press release on the experts' tasks.

"It is a great honour for me and thus also for my entire clinical and scientific environment and I accept the task with gratitude and humility. We have challenging weeks ahead of us that require us to act quickly on a scientific basis. More than ever," says Prof Karagiannidis about his appointment.

The President of Witten/Herdecke University, Prof Dr Martin Butzlaff, is delighted about this appointment: "Professor Karagiannidis is not only an outstanding doctor and clinical teacher for our students, but above all a highly competent, committed and level-headed scientist. His data analyses on the course of the pandemic and on developments in intensive care units are important building blocks for well-founded political decisions - and these must be made again and again and very promptly in the extremely complex weeks ahead of us."

Prof. Dr Horst Kierdorf, Clinical Director of the Cologne Merheim Medical Centre: "Prof. Dr Christian Karagiannidis brings a great deal of clinical and scientific experience from the intensive care management of this pandemic from our Merheim Lung Clinic and from the close exchange with intensive care units in Germany to the Federal Government's Expert Council. We are proud that the Cologne clinics are able to support this administrative body with Prof Karagiannidis!"