Over a career that spanned six decades, Dr. Quentin D. Young made his mark as a national leader for social justice in the United States. His visionary thinking about health care underscores the connection between truly universal, comprehensive health care, civil rights, and social justice. For many years, he was widely regarded as the nation’s preeminent advocate for single-payer national health insurance—sometimes called “an improved Medicare for all.”

Dr. Young pointed out, in 2009, that the United States was spending twice as much as other industrialized nations on health care, about $8,160 per capita. Despite the money spent, people in this country are not healthier than citizens of many other countries. At that point in time, more than fifty million Americans had no health coverage while millions more were inadequately covered.

Young cited peer-reviewed research showing that the bureaucracy and paperwork associated with the private health insurance industry consume about 31 percent of every health care dollar. Streamlining payment through a single nonprofit payer could save more than $400 billion per year, enough to provide comprehensive, high-quality coverage for all Americans. Patients would go to the doctor or hospital of their choice.

In the health care reform movement, he is credited with coining the slogan, “Everybody in, Nobody out.” He spoke on this and related themes before hundreds of physician and lay audiences across the nation.

From 1943-1945, Dr. Young served in the U.S. Army and later in the U.S. Public Health Service. He graduated from Northwestern University Medical School in 1948 and completed his residency in internal medicine at Cook County Hospital in Chicago.

From 1952 until March 2008, he practiced internal medicine in Chicago’s Hyde Park community, and, from 1972 to1981, he served as chairman of the Department of Medicine at Cook County Hospital. For many years he also served as senior attending physician at Michael Reese Hospital on the city’s South Side.

Throughout his career, he displayed deep concern about health care disparities and inequities based on race, income and gender, and he acted on those concerns.

In 1951, Dr. Young co-founded the Committee to End Discrimination in Chicago Medical Institutions, which focused on uprooting racist practices in the city’s hospitals and clinics.

He was a founder and served as national chairman of the Medical Committee for Human Rights (MCHR), which was formed in June 1964 to offer support and, where possible, provide medical care for civil rights workers, community activists and summer volunteers working in Mississippi during Freedom Summer. MCHR also provided support and emergency medical care to anti-war protesters at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago. In October 1968, he was called to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee about his knowledge of the DNC protests; he courageously challenged the committee’s constitutionality and denounced its violation of democratic rights.

During Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s visits to Chicago, Dr. Young served as the civil rights leader’s personal physician.

In 1983, Mayor Harold Washington appointed Dr. Young president of the Chicago Board of Health. And in later years, Young Dr. served, at the state level, as a key health policy advisor to Illinois Governor Patrick Quinn. In 1998, Young served as president of the American Public Health Association.

Dr. Young also served on the American College of Physicians’ Health and Public Policy committee and chaired its subcommittee on Human Rights and Medical Practice. For many years he was featured regularly as the medical commentator on WBEZ, Chicago Public Radio. He held the position of clinical professor of preventive medicine and community health at the University of Illinois Medical Center.

In 1980, Dr. Young founded the Chicago-based and Illinois-focused Health & Medicine Policy Research Group (HMPRG), which provides research, education, policy development and advocacy for policies that impact health systems to improve the health status of all people.  Dr. Young served a HMPRG chairman until 2014, two years before his death.

Young also served as national coordinator of Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP), a national research and education organization representing every state and specialty. Founded in 1987, PNHP coordinates physician spokespeople across the country who advocate for a single-payer national health program.