Civil rights leader Jesse Jackson has been released from Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago after receiving treatment in the intensive care unit, the Rainbow PUSH Coalition announced Friday. Jackson, 82, has been managing a neurodegenerative condition, Progressive Supranuclear Palsy (PSP), for more then a decade.
Jackson was initially diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, but his condition was later confirmed as PSP last April. The disease typically begins in a person’s 60s and shares some symptoms with Parkinson’s,often leading to severe disability within three to five years. His release from the hospital follows a period of care and recovery, and comes as a relief to supporters and those familiar with his decades-long commitment to social justice.
During his hospitalization, Jackson remained focused on his advocacy work, even requesting the preparation of 2,000 baskets of food for those facing malnutrition during the holiday season, according to a previous family statement.
Jackson rose to national prominence as a close aide to Martin Luther King Jr.in the 1960s. Following King’s assassination in 1968, he emerged as a transformative civil rights leader in America, founding Operation PUSH in 1971 to improve economic conditions in Black communities across the US. In 1984, he launched the National Rainbow Coalition, aiming to secure equal rights for all Americans. The two organizations later merged in 1986 to form the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, continuing jackson’s lifelong pursuit of social and economic justice.
