The Department of Paediatrics and Adolescent Medicine has a long history of contributing to paediatrics and child health, both locally and internationally, especially in the areas of infection, vaccination and genetics. Other areas include growth and development, rehabilitation, cancer and cardiac services, and medical education. It has pioneered and established many new sub-specialty services for children since it was established in the early 1960s as the first paediatric department in Hong Kong.

With the Doris Zimmern Professorship in Community Child Health, the Department is committed to developing a comprehensive Community Child Health Programme. Professor Lau, who graduated from the University of Glasgow in 1980, joined the Department in 1988 as a lecturer. Currently Chair Professor in Paediatrics, Head of the Department and Associate Dean in Research of the Medical Faculty, Professor Lau is a well-known educator, researcher and practitioner in paediatrics and child health, specialising in infectious diseases, immunology and genetics.

Professor Lau’s main research interests include primary immunodeficiencies, genetics in childhood and immunological diseases, developmental and viral immunology, as well as control of childhood infectious diseases. He established an Asian Primary Immunodeficiencies Referral Network offering e-consultations and free genetic tests for such patients in China and other Asian countries, supported by the Society for the Relief of Disabled Children (SRDC). He also set up the Asian Lupus Genetics Consortium with collaborators from China and Thailand. His research team has contributed significantly to the understanding of how pathogens, such as the influenza virus cause disease, and possible strategies to control them.

As a child health researcher and advocate he has worked towards the implementation of universal pneumococcal vaccination for Hong Kong children in his role as Chairman of the Working Group on Pneumococcal Vaccination, Department of Health.

Professor Lau is also organising a vaccination programme for 13,000 children under two years old in the earthquake region of Sichuan, in collaboration with paediatricians at Sichuan University and doctors at the Centre for Disease Control, supported by SRDC. His contributions were recognised with the Outstanding Researcher Award and the Mrs Gordon Wu Exchange Professorship by The University of Hong Kong.