Civil rights leader the Rev. Jesse Jackson was hospitalized in Chicago on Wednesday due to symptoms of the neurodegenerative disease progressive supranuclear palsy.
His hospitalization was confirmed in a statement by the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, a social justice organization founded by Jackson.
The 84-year-old Baptist minister and politician has been battling the neurodegenerative disease for more than a decade, according to the statement. He was initially diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, but the PSP diagnosis was confirmed in April.
PSP is an atypical parkinsonian disorder.a group of neurodegenerative diseases that resemble Parkinson's disease in some motor symptoms, but usually have a more rapid progression and a severe prognosis.
The rare brain disease results from the accumulation of tau protein in areas of the brain that control body movement, causing progressive degenerative symptoms including problems with balance, inability to direct gaze, slurred speech, loss of walking and problems swallowing.
Jackson was previously hospitalized in 2021 for COVID-19 with his wife.
The civil rights leader was born in 1941 in segregated Greenville, South Carolina, and rose to prominence alongside the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in the 1960s.
He advocated for corporations to hire more black Americans through Operation PUSH and founded the Rainbow Coalition in the 1980s to unite marginalized groups and working-class voters around shared goals of social, economic and political justice, as well as greater political representation. He was the first black presidential candidate to receive significant national support, winning 3.5 million votes in 1984 and 7 million in 1988.
