Young, Quentin, 1923-

Dr. Quentin D. Young is a physician and a lifelong advocate and activist for social justice in healthcare policy. He was born in 1923 in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois to Abe and Sarah Young and is a national figure in civil rights work, health care reform, anti-war protests, and many other liberal causes, working tirelessly to promote progressive causes for more than six decades. Young was the personal physician to Martin Luther King, Jr., Jesse Jackson, former Mayor of Chicago Harold Washington, author Studs Terkel, and Illinois Governor Patrick Quinn. He was married to Ruth Young (editor of Primavera, a feminist literary journal) until 2007, when she passed away. Young had five children from his previous marriage: Nancy, Polly, Ethan, Barbara, and Michael Young. During his career, Young was active as a policymaker and was the founder and national chairman of the Medical Committee for Human Rights. He was also the chair of medicine at Cook County Hospital from 1972 until 1981, founded the Health and Medicine Policy Research group with John McKnight in 1980, and served as president of the American Public Health Association in 1988. He was a Clinical Professor of Preventive Medicine and Community Health at the University of Illinois Medical Center and Senior Attending Physician at Michael Reese Hospital and also edited the magazine, Health Rights News for many years. In 2008 Young retired from his private practice, and in 2009 he was appointed to chair the Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board.

In 1936, at the age of 13, Young entered Hyde Park High School and quickly became a member of a progressive political group called the American Student Union, and he was also a member of the Young Communist League USA in his youth. After high school, Young attended the University of Chicago from 1940 to 1943 and served in the U.S. Army from 1943 to 1945. Upon being discharged, Young attended the Northwestern University Medical School, graduating in 1948, and subsequently interned at Cook County Hospital where he also did his residency. He received a Master’s of Science in Physiology degree from the University of Illinois at Chicago in 1952.

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