Pandemic episodes have plagued humanity over the centuries. Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome or SARS is an example of a modern pandemic that has recently hit the world. The SARS pandemic challenged health organizations and governments worldwide on how to deal with a modern pandemic episode. This article will explore the origin of SARS and the measures taken to contain and treat the pandemic episode. SARS emerged in mid-November 2002 in southern China's Guangdong province, but was not officially reported to the government health organization until February 2003. of Guangdong (Ahmad, Krumkamp, ​​& Reintjes, 2009). The first case of SARS reported outside of China occurred on March 3, 2003, in Vietnam, followed shortly thereafter by additional cases reported in Hong Kong, Canada, Singapore, and Taiwan (Ahmad, Krumkamp, ​​& Reintjes, 2009). By mid-summer 2003, the World Health Organization (WHO) had been notified of 8437 cases worldwide, with 813 deaths (Zhong et al., 2003). The disease quickly spread from China to Europe, North America and Southeast Asia due to travel from where SARS began. Patients infected with SARS were noted to have atypical pneumonia. They presented with high fever and respiratory problems that rapidly developed into pneumonia within a few days (Zhong et al., 2003). Through serological and nasopharyngeal aspirate testing, coronavirus (CoV) was determined to be the cause of SARS (Zhong et al., 2003). It was also found that the people originally exposed to the virus had had contact with animals, most likely to prepare food, at a fruit and vegetable market in Guangdong province (Zhong et al., 2003). The virus started with animals, jumped to humans and mutated.......middle of paper......?. BMC Public Health, 91-8. doi:10.1186/1471-2458-9-81N. S. Zhong, A.C., B.J. Zheng, A.C., Y.M. Li, A.C., L.L.M., A.C., Poon, Z., H.H. and ... Xu. (2003). Epidemiology and cause of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in Guangdong, People's Republic of China, February 2003. Lancet, 362(9393), 1353-1358.Timen, AA, van Doornum, GJ, Schutten, MM, Conyn-van Spaendonck , M. E., van der Meer, J. M., Osterhaus, A. E., & van Steenbergen, J. E. (2006). Public health implications of using various case definitions in the Netherlands during the global SARS epidemic. Clinical Microbiology and Infection, 12(12), 1214-1220. World Health Organization (WHO). (2004, October). WHO Guidelines for Global Surveillance of SARS Updated Recommendations, October 2004. Retrieved from http://www.who.int/csr/resources/publications/WHO_CDS_CSR_ARO_2004_1.pdf