On the Medical Front With Disease Cowboys

They’re called cowboys, but they don’t ride the range and they aren’t chasing cattle. Instead, they are a dedicated group of virologists who saddle up at the first hint of a disease outbreak and go looking for strange and exotic viruses.

These fearless (or crazy) scientists from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other institutions around the world are humanity’s first line of defense against the new, and old, diseases that spring up in third-world countries but that are just a short plane ride away from Los Angeles and New York.

They are the focus of a four-hour series, “The Coming Plague,” that begins airing Sunday on TBS. Based on science writer Laurie Garrett’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book of the same name, the series travels around the world as the disease cowboys respond to each emerging threat.

Their stories can be harrowing. Dr. Joe McCormick sweated out three days in an African hut with no lights or electricity after he accidentally pricked himself with a hypodermic needle he was using on a woman thought to have Ebola virus, which is nearly 100% fatal. Fortunately, she didn’t.

Dr. Ken Campbell was flown home from Europe in the containment facility used for the first astronauts returning from the moon when he developed a fever after investigating an outbreak of deadly Lassa fever. He survived, but NASA sent him a bill for $17,000.

The book and the series portray a rather gloomy medical outlook as old diseases burst forth in new forms and new viruses spring up out of the jungles where humans are encroaching for the first time.

Malaria and tuberculosis, once thought to be on their way out as public health problems, have come back with a vengeance as the mosquitoes that carry malaria have become resistant of pesticides and the pathogens themselves have become resistant to the best drugs.

Dengue fever, yellow fever, hepatitis and, of course, AIDS are all growing health problems because physicians do not have good tools to fight them. Still newer viruses are expected to follow in the train of the AIDS virus as humans slash and burn their way into the world’s forests.

Recently, a disinfectant maker scared New Yorkers with a series of ads about the number of germs present on handrails and other facilities in the city’s subways. For those who found that prospect scary, “The Coming Plague” should be horrifically frightening.

* “The Coming Plague” premieres 6-8 p.m. Sunday on cable’s TBS. The network has rated the program TV-PG (may not be suitable for young children).