ONE suspected SARS case in South China's Guangdong Province and another SARS case confirmed in Taiwan have put hospitals and officials around the country on high alert. Masked doctors appeared on TV again and reminded people of the horror they felt last Spring when the disease appeared to be sweeping over China.

The epidemic was first reported in South China's Guangdong Province in February after the Spring Festival but failed to get a lot of attention among the public in Shanghai. The matter turned for the worse when the number of cases in Hong Kong kept rising. On April 4, local authorities announced that Shanghai had detected its first SARS victim, a woman who had visited Guangdong and Hong Kong in late March. Soon, with more cases being discovered in Beijing, in North China's Shanxi Province and in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, people realized that the threatened epidemic was really serious.

I clearly remember April 20 being a crucial day which underlined the crisis closing in on the country. At a press conference in Beijing, Gao Qiang, vice-minister of Health, announced that the number of SARS cases in Beijing was 339, compared with the 37 publicized several days before.

Then followed news about the cancellation of the week-long May Day Holiday and of all provincial tours.

The number of people wearing masks in Shanghai jumped overnight. Weekly press conferences were adopted in the city to publicize prevention work against the disease and to release the latest epidemic statistics.

The feeling of local people at that time about SARS was tricky: everyone was hoping the city was as safe as the government said, but many could not help doubting the small number of cases in the city compared with the shocking number in Beijing and other places.

The press conference attended by experts from the World Health Organization on April 25 in Shanghai impressed me. The nature of the press conference attracted the most attention because of the identity of the speakers - they were experts without any official background.

Reassurance from the experts calmed local people and they praised Shanghai's prevention system saying they had found no evidence of any cover-up.

Fear soon dissipated and people started to think about and to discuss some of the problems revealed by the outbreak.

The Shanghai Star covered SARS-focused stories in seven consecutive issues from April 10 and looked at different aspects of how the disease had affected life in the city from postponed weddings, sanitation habits, psychological issues, panic-buying, culinary habits, the public health system, and media reaction.

Sun Shijin, a sociologist from Fudan University told the Shanghai Star that the SARS outbreak was not all bad news.

He said people could look at it as a test of character. We should learn from it - in our society, no one can isolate themselves from the rest. A nation experiencing disaster can grow even stronger.