Professor Robert Burton

Robert Burton is currently a half-time Professor in the School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine at Monash University, Australia (2006-). He also currently holds Honorary Professorial Surgical positions at Melbourne and Monash Universities, (1996- ), and Tianjin University, China (2005- ). He was a Research and Clinical Fellow in Surgery and then Fellow in Vascular and Transplant Surgery/Assistant Professor at Harvard University-Massachusetts General Hospital (1997-1981), then Foundation Professor of Surgical Science, University of Newcastle (1981-1995), where he helped develop Australia’s first problem based medical course and practised vascular/transplant medicine and surgery and medical oncology, then Director of the Cancer Council of Victoria (1995-2002) and member of the Executive Committee of the Australian Cancer Society. He was a member of the Victorian Trauma Foundation Evaluation Committee (2004-7) and is currently a member of the Victorian Neurotrauma Initiative Evaluation Committee (2007- ). He has published over 200 papers and strategic reports; journals include the New England Journal of Medicine, Lancet, Nature, British Medical Journal, Journal of Immunology and Journal of Experimental Medicine

Selected National Appointments: Membership, and then Chairmanship of National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia project grant committees (1986-94) and the Health Advisory Committee (1999-2001), then Membership and subsequently Chairmanship of the Cancer Strategies Group (CSG) of Australia’s Department of Health and Ageing (DHA: 1998-2006), which developed the 1st and 2nd National Cancer Control Plans. Membership of the DHA National Health Priorities Action Council (2002-6), which developed Australia's 1st National Chronic Disease Strategy (2005). Membership of the DHA Cervical and Breast Cancer Screening (1998-2000) and Australian Screening Advisory (2004-6) Committees.

Selected International Appointments: First Strategic Leader for Capacity Building and a Council Member of the International Union Against Cancer (UICC: 2002-6), 8 consultancies (2003- ) for the World Health Organization (WHO) for National Non-Communicable Diseases (NCD)/ Cancer Planning in the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam, and Papua New-Guinea and WHO staff officer advising the Chinese Ministry of Health on the development of China’s National Chronic Disease Plan (2005) Consultant on Community based NCD control-WHO Kobe Centre (2005-6) for projects in China, India, Bangladesh, Indonesia and Japan. Contributions to the current WHO global strategy: Preventing Chronic Diseases: a vital investment (2005), and cancer control on-line monograph-cancer planning (2006). He has undertaken 3 missions for the International Atomic Energy Agency-Programme of Action for Cancer Therapy (2006- ) in Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Morocco. He has an international reputation in cancer immunology and epidemiology research and Cancer/NCD control planning, and has been on organising committees for UICC Congresses (1997, 2006), and the first 2 International Cancer Control Congresses (2006, 2008). He has been a visiting scientist at Oxford University/John Radcliffe Hospital UK (1986-87) and the International Agency for Research on Cancer, France (1992-3), an invited keynote speaker and session Chairman at many International Conferences, including the International Immunology and Transplantation and UICC Conferences. He has spoken at over more than 40 Universities and Medical Research Institutes, including Harvard and Oxford Universities, and the Walter and Eliza Hall and Karolinska Medical Research Institutes.