Background: Cholera is an infectious disease that in the epidemic form should not continue to appear now, as is known from the experience of developed countries
Aim: The aim of this work is to bring to memory the epidemics of cholera, that were introduced to the territory of Poland, in the past and the role of National Institute of Hygiene (PZH) in the fight against them and to demonstrate contemporary danger from cholera outbreaks that still exists in the world
Material and methods: The information from the historic publications were analyzed, the results Polish research performed in National Institute of Hygiene in the second half of the XX century were collected and demonstrated the most recent information from in the world science publications on the subject of cholera and the conditions that were in the origin of the recent outbreaks of cholera mentioned
Results: The data available for the number of cholera victims in the epidemics of XIX century is concerning the persons ill with characteristic clinical symptoms, but the data for XX century is concerning only patients that were infected with by the strain Vibrio cholerae O1 classic type, the bacteria that were described by R. Koch, but from the 70-years of XX century mostly the cases infected with Vibrio cholerae O1 type El-Tor, that was the etiologic agent of the seventh cholera pandemic
Summary and conclusions: The origin of the epidemic cholera is depending on several conditions :appearance in water the infectious agent with the toxin producing character, ecological conditions of the surface waters, and on living conditions of human society which might be infected from the source of infection in water. The presence of the infectious agent in the natural waters should be always taken under special consideration car any worsening of living condition of the human population like natural disaster or war, may still create the dangers of the epidemic of infectious disease, as recently has happened with the outbreak of epidemic of cholera in Yemen
Keywords: cholera; epidemics and pandemic of cholera; Vibrio cholerae O1; epidemiological surveillance; Vibrio cholerae non-O1; non-O139.