A successful U.S.-based ophthalmologist and entrepreneur is making one of the largest gift donations in McMaster University’s history to boost the post-secondary’s biomedical and global health units.
More than $32 million is coming from Marnix Heersink, an Alabama physician and businessman, to create a school of biomedical innovation and entrepreneurship in his name.
“I think McMaster is the perfect place to make this donation because of its well-earned reputation in innovative health care learning and research,” Heersink said in a release.
“Health care, innovation and entrepreneurship go hand-in-hand. We’ve seen how McMaster encourages this trend and I was inspired.”
Heersink was born in the Netherlands but grew up in Burlington, Ont. After graduating as a physician, he moved to Alabama, where he has a successful career as an ophthalmologist and business leader.
Part of the money is also earmarked for a section that will examine threats to global health, such as pandemics and the climate crisis. That centre will become the Mary Heersink Centre for Global Health, named for his wife, a food security author and advocate.
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She is also a founding member of the international advisory board for McMaster’s Global Health Graduate Program.
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“We are very grateful for this major gift from Marnix and Mary Heersink, which will allow us to cement the link between cutting-edge biomedical science and entrepreneurial activity, helping McMaster to lay the foundations for a new innovation ecosystem right here in Hamilton,” McMaster’s president David Farrar said in a statement.
The forthcoming new school will be based at the Michael G. DeGroote Centre for Learning and Discovery on McMaster’s main campus.
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In the future, it will be housed in a new purpose-built building, as part of the development of Canada’s Global Nexus for Pandemics and Biological Threats.
The McMaster gift comes off the heels of an estimated $120-million donation from the Heersinks to the University of Alabama School of Medicine in 2021.
A 2003 donation of just over $100 million from billionaire Michael G. DeGroote, founder of Laidlaw Transportation, is the largest cash gift McMaster has ever received to date.
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