Prof Andreas Sing , MD PhD MA DTM&H is currently Head of the Bavarian State Institute of Health and the Dept. of Public Health Microbiology at the Bavarian Health and Food Safety Authority (LGL). He studied Human Medicine at the Albert-Ludwigs-University of Freiburg/Germany and the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester, MA/USA as well as Sociology & Political Sciences at the University of Freiburg. He obtained a PhD degree in Sociology at the University of Augsburg/Germany. After a post-doc training at the Dept. of Innate Immunity/LPS at the Max Planck-Institute of Immunobiology he obtained his DTM&H at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in London/UK, habilitated in Medical Microbiology & Hygiene with studies on Yersinia Innate Immunity at the Max von Pettenkofer-Institute of the Ludwigs-Maximilian-University (LMU) of Munich and became board-certified in Medical Microbiology. He teaches Medical Microbiology at the LMU, is Head of the GermanNational Consiliary Laboratory on Diphtheria as well as Deputy Head of the National Reference Lab on Borreliosis in the Robert Koch-Institute-run German reference lab  network. He is member of ESGBOR (European Study Group of Lyme borreliosis) and founder member of ESGPHM (European Study Group of Public Health Microbiology) of the European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infections Diseases (ESCMID) and serves as supervisor for the EPIET and EUPHEM fellowship organized by the ECDC (European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control).