INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE

Professor Mark Bellis is Director of Research and Innovation for the Faculty of Health at Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU) and also leads the University’s Public Health Institute (PHI).

As Professor of Public Health and Behaviour Sciences at LJMU, Mark continues to undertake substantive research in the fields of violence prevention, alcohol, drugs, sexual health and child abuse and neglect.

Mark frequently works with the World Health Organization (WHO) and has established two WHO Collaborating Centres (in Violence Prevention and, Investment in Health and Well-being). Professor Bellis continues to act as the UK Focal Point to the WHO on violence and injury prevention.

He is a registered Consultant in Public Health in the NHS and maintains an honorary consultant contract with Public Health Wales NHS Trust.

In 2009, Mark was awarded an OBE for services to healthcare.

He has published over 240 academic papers and more than 300 applied public health reports and books.

Professor Bellis is one of the founding organisers of the International Club Health Conferences and was part of the organising committee for the first Club Health conference in Liverpool in 1998.

Paul Dillon has been working in alcohol and other drug (AOD) field for almost 30 years and has worked in the club health area for much of that time. He has been involved in a range of research projects investigating the use of ecstasy/MDMA, ketamine and GHB and was an investigator on a WHO study examining cocaine use in Australia. Though his own business, Drug and Alcohol Research and Training Australia (DARTA) he has been contracted by many club owners and promoters to assist in the development of AOD policies and procedures. He has also written a range of information resources for those who use drugs in nightlife spaces, as well as for those who work in the industry.

Stefanie is one of the United States’ leading advocates for a harm reduction approach to alcohol and other drug use in nightlife, festivals and events. While at the national advocacy non-profit the Drug Policy Alliance, she founded and ran Safer Partying, which partnered with production companies like Insomniac (EDC Vegas, Escape, Beyond Wonderland), The Do Lab (Lightning in a Bottle) and Made Event (Electric Zoo NY) to adopt health-focused drug education, safety and mental health support practices at their events. She has transitioned that work into an independent consulting business assisting organizations in creating harm reduction materials, promoting harm reduction services and implementing new practices. She also currently works as the Director of Outreach for Fireside Project, a non-profit that runs the Psychedelic Peer Support Line that provides emotional support by call or text to people during or after their psychedelic experiences. She is based in the Boston area.

Karen has a broad public health research portfolio with a particular focus on violence prevention, alcohol use, youth risk behaviours and nightlife health. Her work has included numerous original studies on health and behaviour in nightlife settings, evaluations of preventive interventions and evidence reviews of what works to support healthy nightlife, and she has collaborated in a wide range of international research programmes. Karen has been involved in the international Club Health conferences since their inception and is very excited that the event is returning to Liverpool in 2023.

He’s been working in prevention and advocacy in the field of alcohol, tobacco, and other drugs for around 25 years. In Slovenia, he has been leading the network »Preventive Platform« (www.preventivna-platforma.si) for more than 10 years, in which over 40 mostly NGOs and local governments actively participate or support.

Since 2006, he has been involved in more than 30 European projects in the fields of health, justice, education, youth and research as a project or work package leader. He is the co-author and co-developer of the European Prevention Curriculum (EUPC), published by the EMCDDA in September 2019, and the contributor to the second updated edition of the International Standards on Drug Use Prevention, issued in 2018 by the UNODC and WHO. In 2017, the European Society for Prevention Research (EUSPR) has awarded him with »Leading European Prevention Science Practitioner Honour« at the 4^th EUSPR conference in Vienna (Austria).

In 2020, the Society for Prevention Research (SPR) has awarded him and his wife (Sanela Talić) with »International Collaborative Prevention Research Award«. He is a PhD candidate in Preventive Science at the University of Zagreb (Croatia), President of the International Confederation of Research Associations in the field of Alcohol, Tobacco and Other Drugs (ICARA) and Deputy Chairperson of the Vienna NGO Committee (VNGOC) on Drugs. In 2021 he was an independent consultant of the CICAD/OAS with a mission to develop and implement a training of prevention workforce in Brazil (ISSUP National Chapter Brazil).

Since 1987, he has been actively involved in research and implementation of programs about drug prevention and risk behavior. He is the coordinator of IREFREA Portugal, which conducts cross-national investigation in youth risk behavior and substance use in nightlife settings.

Responsible for several national and international projects/ interventions in recreational contexts and nightlife interventions. 

Organizer of the Club Health Lisbon 2015, the 9th International Conference on Nightlife, Substance Use and Related Health Issues.

Attendees from 36 counties attended the conference; this remains the highest number of participant countries at the event.

Sarah is the Director of the Community Drugs Programme, School of Social Policy, Social Work and Social Justice, UCD.  She has extensive experience in policy, practice and outcome evaluation in relation to addressing complex issues including domestic and sexual violence and drug and alcohol use and her research interests focus on community engaged research as well as creative and participative research methodologies. She has a deep commitment to widening participation and community engaged learning practices, and was joint winner of the CEU 2020 European Award for Teaching Excellence in the Social Sciences and Humanities.

Judith Noijen is a senior staff member of the prevention department of Jellinek in Amsterdam. Jellinek Prevention responds to developments in the field of alcohol and drug related issues, education, policy and research. 

Since 2005 Judith’s focus has been on promoting the role of health, education and science-based policy and interventions in preventing nightlife related risks. She has done so through research, drug checking, staff training, managing the nationwide Celebrate Safe platform and the nightlife outreach program: peer intervention ‘Unity’.  

Between 2015 and 2022 Judith was a board member of the European Nightlife Empowerment & Wellbeing Network (NEW Net). NEW Networks in close collaboration with safer nightlife stakeholders on improving nightlife empowerment and wellbeing on a European level. 

In her current position as a quality advisor for Jellinek’s prevention department, Judith works on intervention development, implementation, standardisation and evaluation in a broader field of substance related preventive interventions.

Adam is a Consultant Addiction Psychiatrist at the South London and Maudsley NHS Trust and Honorary Senior Lecturer at the Institute of Psychiatry, Kings College London. He has spent over a decade researching new trends, focusing on their patterns of use, effect profiles and predictors of harm. He has also monitored the impact of legislation on their use. He has written over 100 papers, monographs and book chapters. He is interested in helping to craft optimal public health responses to drugs and had written papers considering alternatives to criminalization as a means of legislative control. Adam is also founder and director of Global Drug Survey and architect of the drugs meter.