The World Health Organization's decision to put Toronto on a list of cities for travellers to avoid because of SARS was front-page news around world Thursday, especially in Britain.

"Toronto is put into 'quarantine' over SARS outbreak," the Independent newspaper of London announced on the bottom half of its front page.

Inside the paper, a story about how severe acute respiratory syndrome got to Canada was headlined: "One Family Went On Holiday -- And Made Toronto A Global Pariah."

The SARS outbreak was also on page one of the International Herald Tribune, a U.S. newspaper aimed at English-speaking travellers around the world.

The paper's headline read: "Toronto Is Branded As A SARS Risk."

The Daily Telegraph told its readers on page 13: "SARS warning: don't visit Toronto."

Toronto's inclusion, along with Hong Kong, Beijing, and the Chinese provinces of Shanxi and Guangdong, on the WHO's warning list also led the British Broadcasting Corp. and ITV newscasts Wednesday evening. The stories featured full reports from Canada's largest city.

"This is just beginning to sink in. People thought it was just an Asian disease, but I think very quickly they're going to see this is a global disease and Canada is very high on the radar map," CTV's Tom Kennedy said from London.

The WHO advisory saw dozens of countries issue their own travel warnings, including Britain, Australia, Italy and France.

"The SARS story in newscasts (in Britain) was well down a couple of days ago ... for the last 24 hours it has been the number one story in newscasts," said Kennedy.

Toronto's SARS crisis was also big news in the U.S. As Americans tuned into the nightly news Wednesday, the warning to stay away from the city was prominent.

Fox's international news service featured what was perhaps the direst report.

"It started in Asia but now it's twice as lethal in Canada. Canada is suffering worse than China," the Fox news anchor said.

"While the death rate for SARS stands at 5 per cent for the rest of the world, it's at 10 in Canada. And SARS continues to sweep through our neighbours to the north -- Toronto a virtual ghost town."

Until Wednesday's WHO travel warning, Toronto did not figure prominently in world media reporting on SARS, which largely focused on the disease's prominence in Asia.

Toronto made headlines in the U.S. earlier this week, however, when the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) added the city to its list of countries with suspected or documented community transmission of SARS.

The negative international attention the WHO travel advisory is bringing Toronto is likely to further anger Canadian officials, who have reacted with fury to the Geneva-based organization's warning.

The WHO warning will be active for at least three weeks -- double the maximum incubation period for the potentially deadly flu like illness.

With reports from Canadian Press