Medical Advisor

Colin MacKay joined the Canadian Armed Forces in 1983 as a communications and electronics engineer. In 1989 he was selected for medical training and completed his Doctor of Medicine degree at the University of Toronto, followed by his Family medicine Residency at Queen’s University. In 1995 he was first posted as a medical officer in Kingston where he worked in the primary care setting at the Unit and Base level. Following a command appointment responsible for the clinic operations at Shilo, Major MacKay became the Brigade Surgeon in Petawawa where he focused on deployed medical support and also lead the medical component of the Disaster Assistance and Responsef Team (DART) following the earthquake in Turkey in August 1999.

Following post-graduate studies at the University of British Columbia, Lieutenant-Colonel MacKay was appointed Head of Operational Medicine and the Project Director for a biological warfare defence vaccine development project. He deployed to Afghanistan in 2007 as the Commanding Officer of the NATO Multi-national Medical Unit at Kandahar Airfield and as the Commander of Canadian medical operations. After Afghanistan, he led medical staff efforts with the Canadian Forces’ operational commands. Colonel MacKay assumed responsibility for Public Health within the Canadian Forces in July 2009 and subsequently appointed Deputy Surgeon General in 2012, responsible for medical regulation and policy development in the Canadian Forces. He was promoted to Brigadier General and appointed Surgeon General and Commander Canadian Forces Health Services Group in June 2015, responsible for all health services for the Canadian Forces.

He retired in July 2017 and has been involved in small projects since then, volunteering with Canadian Blood Services and the University of Toronto Veteran Mental Health Advisory Committee, working with a couple of start-up companies involved in well-being and mental health, and is a part-time member of the Transportation Appeals Tribunal of Canada