An ECDC technical report

These step-by-step instructions explain how to collect the sample for the bowel cancer screening programme and send it to the laboratory.This screening programme involves a laboratory test to determine whether there is any blood in your stool (faeces or ‘poop’). To take part, you must submit a small sample using the supplied container.

Maria Xiridou works on mathematical modelling of sexually transmitted infections, such as HIV, gonorrhoea, chlamydia, hepatitis B, and monkeypox. She is interested in understanding infectious disease dynamics and how these can be influenced by behavioural changes and public health interventions. Maria has worked on the impact and cost-effectiveness of PrEP and antiretroviral therapy for HIV; risk-group and universal hepatitis B vaccination; antimicrobial resistance in N. gonorrhoeae, the monkeypox outbreak, and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on chlamydia, gonorrhoea, and hepatitis B virus notifications. 

Hester Korthals Altes has modeled diverse aspects of tuberculosis transmission to understand the impact of control measures on the disease dynamics. She has used time series analysis to identify seasonal patterns in tuberculosis, allowing to study factors associated with the incidence of disease. She developed dynamic models of spread to quantify the role of immigration versus transmission within the country. More generally, she is interested in unravelling patterns in infectious diseases in space and time to shed light on factors driving disease. During the COVID pandemic she assisted the public health advice to the Dutch Caribbean. She also followed the relationship between work absenteeism and COVID-19. In 2025, Hester has a secondment at the Amsterdam Municipal Health service and the AMR Zorgnetwerk Noord-Holland Flevoland.