John Paget has worked as an infectious disease epidemiologist for the last 30 years, first at the World Health Organization in Geneva, then at the Swiss Federal Office of Public Health and, more recently, at the Netherlands Institute for Health Services Research (Nivel). He has a PhD in Epidemiology and has worked on the epidemiology and surveillance of influenza and respiratory syncytial virus in Europe for the past 20 years. He was an Associate Editor of BMC Infectious Diseases and is the Co-Chair of the Global Influenza Initiative.