A western African nation — Nigeria — that survived its brush with Ebola this summer offers lessons in how to derail a potential pandemic, says an American biosafety expert who worked on Nigeria's rapid early response as the disease hit nearby countries.
Debra Sharpe, president of Sharpe Solutions International in Georgia, told "MidPoint" host Ed Berliner on
Newsmax TV Friday that her experience training Nigerian health care workers against Ebola proved that governments can succeed — but need time and expert help to get it right.
Story continues below video.
Note: Watch Newsmax TV now on DIRECTV Ch. 349 and DISH Ch. 223
Get Newsmax TV on your cable system – Click Here Now
Before three Ebola cases turned up in September in a bustling Nigerian oil hub, Port Harcourt, Sharpe was on the ground with two groups — the Elizabeth R. Griffin Research Foundation and Hospitals for Humanity — handling intensive, weeks-long infection safety training as guests of the Nigerian government.
"It was because of the [Nigerian] Ministry of Health support, and allowing us to train over 800 healthcare workers prior to the first outbreak in Port Harcourt, that we had such a successful mission there and they have stopped any new cases of Ebola arising," said Sharpe.
"There are ways that governments can intervene and work effectively," she said. "But to date, we have not seen that happen in the U.S. and we really need to get people all on the same page."
Story continues below video.
Sharpe said she was "not shocked at all" by the Ebola infections of two Dallas nurses who treated a dying man from Liberia based on guidance their hospital received from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Sharpe has worked in pathogen containment facilities that handle everything from anthrax to the avian flu virus, "and it would take me anywhere from four to six weeks to have my staff members trained and be competent enough to work in those environments without getting infected," she said.
Other nurses at the Dallas hospital, Texas Presbyterian, have charged that
little or no training was given to medical staff who treated Ebola victim Thomas Eric Duncan.
Sharpe said that true readiness for treating Ebola "takes a lot more than downloading the recommendations and the procedures from the CDC, putting them in a book and having them be signed off [on] by hospital administration."
The CDC, meanwhile, is not getting enough help where it needs expertise, she said.
"We have not been tapping our biosafety professionals and the people that really understand what it is like to work, on a day to day basis, wearing lots and lots of personal protective equipment," said Sharpe.
Even the most skilled doctors and nurses need to be taught about infection — "how you can contaminate a clean area or how you can contaminate your skin if you inadvertently scratch your eyebrow or rub your eye, or if you didn't take your gloves off appropriately," she said.
Sharpe said that the disease, while not airborne, is nevertheless transmissible because even a single droplet of Ebola-contaminated bodily fluid from someone with symptoms can contain "billions of virus particles, and the infectious dose is so low, which makes it easier to catch."
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.