Professor John Mackenzie retired in May 2008. He was Professor of Tropical Infectious Diseases at Curtin University, and an inaugural holder of a Premier’s Fellowship, Deputy CEO of the Perth Node of the Australian Biosecurity CRC and Honorary Professor of the University of Queensland. He serves on a number of international committees with the United Nations, World Health Organization (WHO) and other Non-Government Organisations. His recent research interests were in mosquitoborne virus diseases and emerging zoonotic viruses. He has published over 275 major papers and research chapters on these and other research topics concerned with humans and animal diseases.

Curtin University of Technology and the Australian Biosecurity CRC for Emerging Infectious Disease hosted the John Mackenzie Farewell Seminar on Friday 18 April 2008 at the BankWest Theater on Curtin's Bentley campus.

The Seminar featured presentations by (in order of presentation):

Dr David Smith  (PathWest Laboratory Medicine) - Of Mice and Men (and Mosquitoes): It's a wonderful One World;

Dr David Heymann (World Health Organisation) - Emerging infectious diseases: health workers on the frontline; and

Prof John Mackenzie - Emerging diseases in Asia-Oceania: What should we be doing to provide an early warning of potential threats?

Audio and video files of these seminars are available.

Read his retirement message to ScienceNetwork Western Australia: 'Premier's Fellow warns of pandemic threat'