International Information

Professor David A. Warrell MA DM DSc FRCP is the world’s leading clinical toxinologist, principally famous for his work on prospective studies of snakebite in tropical developing countries. Together with Associate Professor James Tibballs, he was the first appointed Principal Fellow of the AVRU in 1997. He also holds an appointment as Professor Emeritus of Tropical Medicine and Infectious Diseases at the University of Oxford. Professor Warrell was also the Honorary Clinical Director of the Alistair Reid Venom Research Unit at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine and the Founding Director of the Centre for Tropical Medicine at Oxford University.

He has conducted research in California, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Kenya, Tanzania, Thailand, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Papua New Guinea, Brazil, Ecuador, Colombia and Peru. Professor Warrell is Editor of the Oxford Textbook of Medicine, Essential Malariology, and Expedition Medicine. He is a Consultant to the World Health Organisation, the British Army, the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the Medical Research Council (UK) and Royal Geographical Society. He has held the office of President of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene and of the International Federation for Tropical Medicine.

Professor Warrell (shown above) officially opened the Struan Sutherland laboratory, in the Department of Pharmacology at the University of Melbourne on February 2, 2004. He has strongly encouraged the Unit's work in PNG and has contributed a chapter in a recent AVRU book, the first covering the management of venomous bites and stings in PNG. In September 2005 he was awarded the prestigious Mary Kingsley Medal in Tropical Medicine, by the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine.