Ghassan Dbaibo

Dr. Ghassan Dbaibo is currently Professor and Vice-Chairman, Department of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, Head, Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases, and Professor, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics at the American University of Beirut (AUB) in Beirut, Lebanon. 

After earning his Medical Doctorate from AUB, Dr. Dbaibo trained in Pediatrics and Pediatric Infectious Diseases at Duke University in North Carolina, USA and became American Board-certified in Pediatrics and Pediatric Infectious Diseases. After joining the faculty there for two years, Dr. Dbaibo moved back to AUB where he is now Professor of Pediatrics and Founding Head, Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases, which he established in 2009. In 2010, he established the Pediatric Infectious Diseases fellowship program at AUB. He is the Founding Director of the Center for Infectious Diseases Research based at AUB and Director of the Lebanese Inter-Hospital Pneumococcal Surveillance Program (LIPSP) similarly based at AUB. He is also founder and co-director of the Primary Immunodeficiency Diseases Program at AUB Medical Center and the Founding Director of the National Neonatal Screening Program for Primary Immunodeficiency Diseases (NaSPID). Dr. Dbaibo practices General Pediatrics and consults on Pediatric Infectious Diseases at AUB. 

Dr. Dbaibo is a member of the Regional Immunization Technical Advisory Group (RITAG) for the WHO Eastern Mediterranean Regional Office (EMRO), a member of the WHO Immunization Agenda 2030 Research and Innovation Strategic Priorities Working Group (IA2030 SP7 WG), a member of the Product Development of Vaccines Advisory Committee (PDVAC) for the WHO, a member of the Strategic Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE) Working Group on Respiratory Syncytial Virus Immunization, and a member of the WHO Technical Advisory Group on Group B Streptococcus Vaccine Development.  

Dr. Dbaibo was lead investigator on many clinical protocols including several meningococcal and influenza vaccine trials. In addition to establishing the national surveillance for invasive pneumococcal disease (LIPSP), he also established sentinel surveillance for rotavirus in hospitalized children, and currently leads another national sentinel surveillance program for influenza, RSV, and SARS-CoV-2 in hospitalized patients of all ages as part of the Global Influenza Hospital Surveillance Network (GIHSN). To supplement his study of clinical infectious diseases in children and their prevention by vaccines, his research interests include the biochemical basis of apoptosis and the sphingolipid-regulated stress response to infection, cancer, and hypoxia, the role of viral oncogenes in perturbing cellular signal transduction pathways, and the molecular basis of congenital immunodeficiencies. Dr. Dbaibo supervised more than 65 post-doctoral research fellows in both Pediatric Infectious Diseases and in Biochemistry and more than 20 graduate students in Biochemistry (Master of Science and PhD). He has authored more than 195 publications in peer-reviewed journals with close to 10,000 citations and an H-index of 48.