OBJECTIVES: Acinetobacter baumannii is globally emerging as a dangerous nosocomial pathogen with enormous capacity to acquire antibiotic resistance genes from related and unrelated bacteria. Among the several classes of antibiotics available, beta-lactams are considered the safest, cheapest and most widely used group. However their effectiveness has been reduced by the production of beta-lactamase enzymes by bacteria. SHV are one of the very important types of beta-lactamases that confer resistance to variety of beta-lactam antibiotics. The aim of this study was to check the prevalence of SHV beta-lactamases in A. baumannii isolates. METHODS: A total of 47 multiple drug resistant Acinetobacter baumannii isolates were collected from two tertiary care hospitals in Pakistan during 2013, and were screened by PCR for the presence of SHV beta-lactamases genes. RESULTS: PCR amplification of SHV genes confirmed that forty percent (n=19) of the isolates were positive for SHV genes. CONCLUSIONS: Genes for the SHV beta-lactamases are carried by both the chromosomes and plasmids, and hence clonal dissemination and horizontal gene transfer (HGT) both contribute to this overwhelming prevalence of SHV beta-lactamases in Acinetobacter baumannii isolates. A. baumannii is the most important opportunistic nosocomial pathogen and its immense capacity of acquiring and sharing resistance with other bacteria against modern antibiotics is pushing us into the post-antibiotic era.