tonight on "nightline," seventh grade nose job. her insecurities may be typical for a 13-year-old but her path to acceptance, far from it. tonight, a tale of teasing, teen angst and a parent's decision to let their daughter get plastic surgery. contagion. it is a nightmare hollywood see their voe. deadly viruses jumping from animals to humans. but in fact, it is all too real. tonight, we head into the jungle with a virus hunter, racing to catch the next invisible threat before it is too late. and candidates unspun. wisecracks, comebacks and zingers, oh, my. >> i'm still speaking. i'm still speaking. >> but what do you really need

to know from tonight's gop debate? we hit the reverse button on the spin cycle. >> announcer: from the global resources of abc news, with terry moran, cynthia mcfadden and bill weir in new york city, this is "nightline," october 11th, 2011. >> good evening, all. plastic surgery is not as taboo as it was in dames gone by. if you can afford it, the reasoning goes, why not? but how does that reasoning change when the patient is barely a teenager? just beginning to navigate the thorns of self-image? well, tonight, we meet a 13-year-old and her parents who made an unusual choice, and abc's juju chang has her story. >> it's over here, like, it hangs. >> reporter: nicolette taylor hates her nose. >> it hangs crooked. rrl she isn't the kind of girl you would expect to be bullied. she's a popular and active eighth grader. look at how cute you are.

as a little girl, she worked as a model, on magazine covers and catalogs. she broke her nose when she was 2 and again when she was 8. that's when the teasing started. >> i came off the bus, i was crying. this girl, mom, she's calling me big nose taylor. i don't even know her. >> reporter: nasty comments posted on her facebook page caused her to come home day after day in tears. >> this one kid was like, hey, big nose. hey, what you are doing? >> reporter: but doesn't every kid get teased in school? >> i was more concerned that everybody could see it, all my friends could see it and i didn't want them to say anything because gossip goes around and really hurts. >> reporter: and so nicolette's parents made a decision. they took her to see a plastic surgeon to talk about a nose job. >> we were judgare judged by th look. >> reporter: dr. sam rizk tells us 25% of the nose jobs he does are performed on teenagers. >> people make a decision when they see a kid with a big nose

and they get bullied. >> reporter: how do you know being able to withstand that kind of criticism doesn't just build character in a child? >> i think in some cases, it doesn't. it destroys it. >> reporter: but at 13, nicolette would be his youngest rhino mrasty patient ever. nicolette's parents knew that, but they defend their decision. there are a lot of parents out there who say, what kind of a mom gives a 13-year-old a nose job? >> i think it's fine. for awhile we say it gives you character but if that's the one thing that makes her so insecure -- i don't have a problem with it. >> reporter: nearly a quarter of a million teens had cosmetic surgery last year. and there are no official age limits. but most doctors recommend that a teen be fully grown before having facial plastic surgery. >> in a female, the nose is fully grown at 14 and also their foot had to be fully grown. >> reporter: how do you know that? >> you ask the mom when they

change the shoe size if they had any change in their feet recently. >> reporter: and so, on a july morning this past summer, nicolette and her parents arrived at dr. rizk's office for elective plastic surgery. nicolette was just a few weeks out of seventh grade. we spoke with psychologists about whether there's an emotional downside to having a child so young take such a radical step and change her appearance to avoid bullying. what can parents do, aside from giving their child a nose job, to help them cope with bullying? >> i think it is helpful for kids to learn to stand up for themselves. that's not true. i don't care what you think about my nose, i'm happy with it. >> reporter: and yet the doctor understands the lastic impact online bullying can have on a child. he thinks kids should stay off all social media until age 15. despite the fact that 7 1/2 million facebook users are 13 or younger. so, who you're saying is, she's old enough to get a nose job but

really nod old enough to be on facebook? >> i would think so, yes. i think parents should have full access to their kids electronic communications. >> reporter: nicolette's operation takes about an hour and a half. her parents are there when she comes out of the fog of anesthesia. >> what's going on? >> what's going on? you're in the recovery room. >> reporter: finally, one week after nicolette's operation -- >> you remember your old nose? there are the pictures. >> oh, my gosh. >> ew. >> reporter: her entire family has come to the office for the big unveiling. >> oh, my god, nicolette. >> it's a gorgeous -- >> oh, my god, it's so pretty. >> reporter: the whole family is happy with what they see. >> you're crying. wow. this is a big moment for you, huh nicolette? in yeah. >> i was getting choked up. just seeing her reaction and knowing how much it means to her. if it's something you can do for

your child that's really a factor, why would you not? >> reporter: the before and after leaves nicolette searching for words. >> i see, like, a -- i don't even know, i can't even explain it in words. it's just so amazing. >> reporter: she started a new school and even made the cheerleading team. surgery may not quiet the bullies forever. but nicolette claims she now doesn't care. which her parents hope is a change that may be more than skin deep. for "nightline," i'm juju chang in new york. >> thanks to juju chang for that. and just ahead, how do you track down a potential mass killer that can't be seen with the naked eye? we venture into the jungle to find out. [ male announcer ] at&t and verizon charge you extra for going over 2 gigabytes of data. t-mobile slows down your data speed. with sprint you don't get charged extra

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>> announcer: "nightline" continues from new york city with bill weir. >> somewhere on the other side of the planet, in a hidden corner of a tropical rainforest, pumping through the veins of some unknown animal, a new virus is incubating, that could end human life as we know it. at least that's the fear. and the motivation of the intrepid virus hunter we're about to meet. and to find him, abc's dr. richard besser went to the ground zero of global con dtday on. >> reporter: in the jungles of cameroon, hiking through vines with nathan wolfe is so beautiful that you almost forget what he's here for. searching the lethal creatures that he's convinced are lurking out of sight. tiny microbes, deadly new viruses. >> it's what our work is focused on, understand what's out there that could potentially harm us. >> reporter: we joined him and

his vie raus forecasting team on their latest trip to central africa. this one, to cameroon, when he fears may become the birthplace for the next deadly pandemic. he wants to stop it before it can get started. so, looking in central fafry ka, because there have been a lot of diseases that have come from this part of the world, it's a good place to try to see what might be next? >> yeah, we're looking, where do we have a diversity of animals and where do we have people with a lot of exposure to those animals? >> reporter: hollywood movies like "contagion" have tapped into the fear of new vie rulss leaping from animals to humans but that prospect isn't farfetched. in fact, it's happened. in asia, in 2002, 8,000 cases of s.a.r.s. then, h1n1 leapt from pigs to humans and killed 18,000 people. and of course, aids.

65 million have died. the original source? a cyrus from chimpanzees from this region. to get here, we flown to the teeming city of duoala and then drove to kribi, where we meet with nathan to begin a trek into the bush. >> we're going to be headed to this site. >> reporter: lots of wild life there? >> lots of wild life and a lot of them harbor diseases that may have the potential to cross into humans. >> reporter: ready to go? >> let's do it. >> reporter: it's an eight-hour drive and we entered territory with such extreme poverty that they must eat what they can hunt. the result is this. receiving bush meat. is there a problem in terms of pandemics or disease with eefting pork pine? >> we're not reallyconsumption. >> reporter: it's not eating it,

but handling it? >> getting a bite, contact you have with raw animal meat. >> reporter: in this village, as one family was finishing a meat hooked up with lthis local hunter. he may find new viruses in addition to meat. you have to set a lot of traps to get a hit? >> in general, yes. >> reporter: junior lays traps throughout the forest. >> he steps on that stick -- >> that's right. >> reporter: it's grueling work. we've been walking for about an hour and a half. lots of traps, but so far, not one animal. and while this place may feel remote, wolfe is quick to point out that is not the case. when you see a logging road, what do you think about? >> i think about the potential for both animals, as well as humans with new viruses, to get to cities, cities where you have planes, boats. >> reporter: so things that happen in central africa don't

stay here? >> you got it. >> reporter: whoa. junior finds only empty traps on this day. but another hunter in the village has had luck. his wife is preparing a pork pine to be cooked. and i get a first-hand look at how a virus might pass between an animal and human. as she goes about her task, try to protect myself. she takes no precautions. >> careful. >> reporter: wolfe and his team monitor the hunter's blood. >> we have two jobs. understand the nature of exactly what's out there in different animal species. and then to find the people who have contact and see what's jumping over. and then to ask, are these things spreading, are they causing disease? >> reporter: and they rely on the hunters to gather crucial blood samples from the animals they track. so, from five drops of blood you can tell what viruses are in that animal? ? we can look at the genetic structure of the animal, we can look at the viruses that occur. one of these spots could lead us

to discovers the next pandemic. >> reporter: how many cards have you collected so far? >> almost 20,000. >> reporter: 20,000? so these are your live buildings? where do all the samples end up? here. whoa. this looks like the kind of lab i'd see at the cdc. >> absolutely. >> reporter: housed in a military facility, it's one of their main laboratories. so, in those boxes are all of your samples? >> yes. >> reporter: kricritics charge t the money should not be spent on diseases that might happen. with all the problems going on in the world, hiv, tb, how can we possibly afford to look for a virus that may never cause a disease? >> i mean, i think i would flip that right on its head and ask the question, how could we afford not to? >> reporter: while some say he may be looking for a needle in a haystack, wolfe's team has discovered a range of gnu animal viruses, some they have also be

found in humans. and out in the jungle, he's still prowling for the one that might kill us. for "nightline," i'm dr. richard besser in cameroon. >> nathan wolfe's new book was published today and dr. richard besser's reporting, part of abc's initiative, be the change, save a life, produced with the bell and melinda gates foundation and we're grateful to both. coming up next, the gop debate. who did him or herself the most good? and vice versa. stick around. luck? i don't trade on luck. i trade on fundamentals. analysis. information. i trade on tradearchitect. this is web-based trading, re-visualized. streaming, real-time quotes. earnings analysis. probability analysis: that's what opportunity looks like. it's all visual. intuitive. and it's available free, wherever the web is. this is how trade strategies are built. tradearchitect. only from td ameritrade. welcome to better trade commission free for 60 days

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twas a night of the roundtable for republican presidential hopefuls in new hampshire tonight. the eight candidates facing each other, even questioning each other, which was quite telling. so, we launched our knew series, unspun, in which we trans late that political speak into plain english. and helping me to do that, amy water here in new york and matt dowd, our analyst there in new hampshire. good to see both of you. let's talk about herman cain, who has shot up in the polls, he wants to blow up the irs as we know it. place a 9% sales tax on everything we buy, which actually flows off his tongue this way. >> nine, nine, nine. nine, nine, nine. nine, nine, nine plan. >> but it seems the more he has to defend this plan, the more hits he's taking from economists and competitors alike. >> when you take the nine, nine, nine plan and you turn it enough

side down, the devil's in the details. >> how many people here are for a sales tax in new hampshire? that's how many votes get in new hampshire. >> so, matt, what did you make of herman cain tonight? >> well, he came into this debate rising in the polls. i think he actually handled himself well. i think anybody that takes heat in these debates, as we learned over the last month, is the candidate that is surging or is competitive in the lead. but i think he likes his position since he's getting asked questions, that means he must be doing well. >> let's unspin rick perry. this is supposed ed td to be h comeback debate. >> tonight, he was basically the man who wasn't there. he faded very much into the background. he wasn't able to get any good hits in on his primary opponent, namely mooilt romney. >> i'm still speaking. i'm still speaking. i'm still speaking. >> and he didn't even get any friendly fire. because as pointed out by matt, he's not seen as the front-runner. the good news for rick perry?

there's no "saturday night live" skit to come out of this. the bad news, there's no espn highlight reel, either. >> we have less than 1% of our kids that are uninsured. you have a million kids uninsured in texas. >> matt, let's go to mitt romney. when it came time to question, they were all given the opportunity to question each other, most of them went after mitt romney. he gave a softball to michele bachmann. >> you laid out some pretty bold ideas in regards of cutting back the scale of the federal government. no question that's an important element of getting people back to work. >> what does that tell you? >> he's sending a signal. he got governor christie's endorsement, he's saying, i'm the guy that is going to take this away and be nice to everybody. >> so, finally, matt and amy, who gained the most, who lost the most? >> this is a two-person race. it's cain and romney.

a month ago, it was romney and perry. who gained the most? i think romney, methodical, keeps going and i think cain handled himself well. they went into this race competitive and come out that way. >> amy? >> all right, i agree. romney is still the man to beat. cain did well. the losers, beyond rick perry that we pointed out, ben bernanke and the fed. >> the first person to fire is bernanke. >> i think they got hit more than anybody. >> amy walter, thank you, our thanks to matt dowd, as well. >> and thank you very much for watching abc news. we hope you check in on "good morning america." they're working while you're resting. and we'll meet you right back here tomorrow night.