After the epidemic was declared over the WHO reviewed the outbreak and the way that they had dealt with it. Lessons learned from SARS were incorporated into the procedures of the WHO. The speed with which SARS had spread around the world also focused the international community in updating the international health regulations. In 1995 member states had agreed the need to update the existing regulations but at the time of the SARS epidemic in 2003 they were not close to agreement. After the epidemic agreement was quickly reached and the regulations were updated in 2005.

The following graph shows how the number of reported cases was distributed throughout the outbreak.