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Dr. Evelyn McKnight
Dr. Evelyn McKnight

Dr. Evelyn McKnight is one of 99 cancer survivors who contracted hepatitis C through substandard medical care at the Fremont, Nebraska, Cancer Center in 2000-2002. Evelyn was infected with hepatitis C virus (HCV) while battling breast cancer in 2000. Nebraska Health and Human Services and CDC officials determined that these patients had been infected with HCV that was transmitted by reused, contaminated syringes during chemotherapy treatments. Nurses, working under the direction of her oncologist, used unsafe practices and had reused syringes to access multi-dose vials of saline used as part of her treatment regimen.

This was the largest known healthcare-associated outbreak of hepatitis C in U.S. history.

Evelyn’s personal experience motivated her to bring attention to, and advocate on behalf of, safe injection practices. She founded Hepatitis Outbreaks’ National Organization for Reform (www.HONOReform.org). The organization, founded in 2006, works from the grassroots level to the legislative level to encourage safety by design, incentive and education. She has traveled the country giving presentations to thousands on the critical necessity of injection safety. Her efforts have reached Washington, DC, where a GAO investigation outlined the causes and possible solutions to the numerous disease outbreaks that have resulted from unsafe injections across the country. She helped lead the congressional briefing “Injections without Infections.”

In partnership with the CDC, the CDC Foundation and the Safe Injection Practices Coalition, Evelyn was instrumental in the development and securing of funds for the One and Only Campaign. The One and Only Campaign is an educational campaign to educate providers about safe injection practices and to empower patients to partner with their healthcare providers for safe healthcare.

Evelyn has been featured on a number of national news outlets including CBS News, CNN, USA Today, the Wall Street Journal and Newsday and is a renowned patient safety advocate and speaker. She is also a co-author of an award-winning book, A Never Event: Exposing the Largest Outbreak of Hepatitis C in American Healthcare History, which chronicles the story of the Nebraska hepatitis C outbreak.

Along with Lauren Lollini, a survivor of the Colorado outbreak, she writes a regular blog, Survivor Stories (www.HONOReform.org/blog), which includes the personal stories of individuals affected by unsafe injections and other stories with a connection to injection safety.
Evelyn and HONOReform made their international debut in 2014, traveling to India to review injection safety needs in the country and address a coalition of local stakeholders. Later in 2014, Evelyn shared her story at the Safe Injection Global Network meeting at the World Health Organization.

Evelyn lives in Fremont with her husband, Tom, a family physician. Two of their three sons are physicians, and the third is completing his medical residency.

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