Associate Professor and Senior Fellow, University of Toronto 
Lawyer, Author and Mental Health Advocate

Neil Seeman is a lawyer, academic, author, entrepreneur and mental health advocate whose work focuses on mental health stigma, health systems innovation, inclusive data and entrepreneurial mental health. 

At the University of Toronto, Neil is an Associate Professor (Status-Only) and Senior Fellow at the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation in the Dalla Lana School of Public Health. He is also the Mary and Philip Seeman Lead in Knowledge Transfer at the HIVE Lab and Senior Academic Advisor to the Investigative Journalism Bureau. 

His work explores how data and technology can improve health systems and public policy and better represent people often excluded from traditional research. He co-founded the Health Strategy Innovation Cell and founded the global data technology company RIWI, serving as its CEO from 2011 to 2021. 

Neil is the author of Accelerated Minds: Unlocking the Fascinating, Inspiring, and Often Destructive Impulses that Drive the Entrepreneurial Brain, which examines the relationship between entrepreneurship, brain science and mental health. The book was released in Japan in 2025 as Entrepreneurship Addiction. He also co-authored XXL: Obesity and the Limits of Shame, shortlisted for the Donner Prize, and Psyche in the Lab: Celebrating Brain Science in Canada. 

His research, commentary and essays have appeared in Nature, the Canadian Medical Association Journal, Synapse, the Toronto Star and Healthcare Quarterly. He was a founding member of the editorial board of the National Post and is Co-Founder and Publisher of Sutherland House Experts. 

In 2025, Neil received the Lifetime Mental Health Advocacy Award from the Reach Out Together Foundation. He holds a Juris Doctor from the University of Toronto Faculty of Law, was admitted to the Ontario Bar in 1997, and holds a Master of Public Health from Harvard University.