Johan Mackenbach is Professor of Public Health and chair of the Department of Public Health at Erasmus MC, University Medical Center Rotterdam, the Netherlands. His research interests are in social epidemiology, medical demography, and health policy. He has (co-)authored more than 500 papers in international, peer-reviewed scientific journals, as well as a number of books. He is a former editor-in-chief of the European Journal of Public Health. He is actively engaged in exchanges between research and policy, among others as a member of the Health Council of the Netherlands and the Council for Public Health and Health Care. He is also a member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, and honorary professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.