About Us
Welcome to the Edwin S.H. Leong Centre for Healthy Children!
Established in 2019, the Edwin S.H. Leong Centre for Healthy Children is an interdisciplinary research centre at the University of Toronto and The Hospital for Sick Children. The Centre brings together researchers to address and reduce inequities in child health outcomes resulting from the social and structural determinants of health. To learn more about the Centre, our staff, and our current activities, we encourage you to explore our website.
History
In 2019, University of Toronto alumnus Dr. Edwin S.H. Leong and the Tai Hung Fai Charitable Foundation gave a landmark gift of $25 million to establish the Edwin S.H. Leong Centre for Healthy Children. This gift was the largest donation to the University of Toronto from outside Canada. In 2020, Dr. Astrid Guttmann and Dr. Eyal Cohen were appointed co-directors to lead the Centre’s vision of “harnessing interdisciplinary research to promote the flourishing of every child and family.” The Centre is a partnership between the University of Toronto’s Temerty Faculty of Medicine and The Hospital for Sick Children and is located in the Peter Gilgan Centre for Research and Learning in Toronto, Canada. Read more.
About the Donor
Meet Dr. Edwin S.H. Leong
Dr. Edwin S. H. Leong is a global leader in business and philanthropy, whose remarkable record of generosity is rooted in a desire to help support society’s most vulnerable people in Hong Kong and around the world.
Dr. Leong graduated from the University of Toronto with a master’s degree in computer science in 1974. Today, he is Chairman of Tai Hung Fai Enterprise Co. Ltd. (), a diversified property investment and development company he founded in 1977. The company’s success spurred Dr. Leong to establish the Tai Hung Fai Charitable Foundation () in 2005 to help provide care and medical support for disadvantaged seniors and underprivileged children. The foundation also funds scholarships, fellowships and a professorship for research studies related to healthy aging and paediatrics.
Having earned his undergraduate degree from the University of British Columbia, Dr. Leong gave $24 million to UBC’s Faculty of Medicine in 2018—the largest gift in the school’s history. The gift established the Edwin S.H. Leong Healthy Aging Program, which provides research aimed at helping people live longer and enjoy a better quality of life in later years.