David Diemert

David Diemert, MD, FRCP(C), is a Professor of Medicine and of Microbiology, Immunology, and Tropical Medicine at the George Washington University (GW) School of Medicine and Health Sciences. Dr. Diemert earned his medical degree from the University of Alberta (Edmonton, Canada), and completed internal medicine residency and infectious diseases and medical microbiology fellowship training at McGill University in Montréal. He is a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians (Canada) with certification in the specialties of internal medicine, infectious diseases and medical microbiology. Additionally, he received training in clinical tropical medicine through the University of Alabama at Birmingham’s Gorgas Course in Lima, Peru. After completing medical training, he worked from 2001 to 2005 at the Malaria Vaccine Development Branch of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, where he was responsible for conducting clinical trials of novel malaria vaccines in the United States and Mali. In 2005 he joined the Sabin Vaccine Institute lead the clinical development of hookworm vaccines and since 2008 has been a faculty member at GW. Dr. Diemert’s research is focused on conducting clinical trials to develop new vaccines for neglected tropical diseases and viral infections in the United States, Brazil, and Africa. He has served as the Principal Investigator on multiple clinical trials of COVID-19, influenza, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), HIV, hookworm, schistosomiasis, Lassa fever, malaria, and flavivirus vaccines. More recently, he has developed controlled human infection models (CHIMs) at GW for intestinal helminths such as hookworm and whipworm (Trichuris trichiura) to test the efficacy of interventions such as investigational vaccines and medications as well as the immunomodulatory effect of these parasites on inflammatory diseases such as ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s Disease. He currently has funding from NIAID/NIH, US Department of Defense, the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI), Pfizer, and Sanofi Pasteur.

Dr. Diemert’s international work has involved establishing clinical trial sites in resource limited settings such as one in the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil. This site has been established in partnership with the Fundação Oswaldo Cruz (FIOCRUZ), and has included establishing a clinic in a rural area of Brazil, assembling and training a Brazilian clinical trials team, establishing quality laboratory facilities at the field site, conducting preparatory studies of helminth epidemiology and immunology, and overseeing several Phase 1 and 2 trials of investigational vaccines for hookworm and schistosomiasis. Additional international partnerships with the Centre de Recherches Médicales de Lambaréné (CERMEL) in Gabon and the Makerere University Walter Reed Project (MUWRP) in Uganda have resulted in successful Phase 1 and 2 trials of investigational vaccines targeting neglected tropical diseases.