Jennifer Schumann, Phd Email & Phone Number

Associate Professor Jennifer Schumann is Head of the Drug Intelligence Unit at the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine and Monash University’s Department of Forensic Medicine. She is a forensic pharmacologist and toxicologist, with nearly two decades of experience interpreting the involvement of alcohol and other drugs in death. Jennifer is an Associate Investigator and Public Health Lead on the NHMRC funded project, the Emerging Drugs Network of Australia (EDNA), and Forensic Lead on the state-based project, EDNA-Vic (EDNAV). Jennifer led the world’s first research program on coward punch assaults in partnership with the Stop the Coward Punch Campaign, which was instrumental in changing Australian legislation. Her work was also pivotal in the 2018 rescheduling of codeine to prescription-only. She has published extensively, presented her research throughout the world, and received a number of awards and travel grants in recognition of her work, including a prestigious 2019 Churchill Fellowship. In 2014, Jennifer was a visiting postdoctoral researcher at the Karolinska Institute and National Board of Forensic Medicine, Sweden, and the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research in Paris, supported by a Victoria Fellowship. Jennifer is President of the Forensic and Clinical Toxicology Association (FACTA), Editor of The International Association of Forensic Toxicologists (TIAFT) Bulletin, on the Board of Directors for Stop the Coward Punch foundation, an Adviser for Pill Testing Australia, and Chair of the FACTA Drug Checking Committee. Her research has stimulated public debate, engaged media and been directly responsible for changes in Australian policy and practice.