Australia's first case of AIDS? Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia and HIV in 1981

To present the earliest Australian case of the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) reported to date.

A 72-year-old man developed a prolonged illness, beginning in February 1981, characterised by anorexia, malaise, weight loss and an episode of herpes zoster. In July he noted the insidious onset of dyspnoea with a productive cough. He was admitted to hospital in August, where Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia was diagnosed from a transbronchial lung biopsy. Splenomegaly and generalised lymphadenopathy were noted but a scalene lymph node biopsy examined at that time failed to establish an underlying diagnosis. The patient was single and lived alone in an inner suburb of Sydney. He had never left Australia and had never received a blood transfusion. His sexual history is not recorded, nor is there any documented history of intravenous drug use.

The patient died in September 1981. Recent re-examination of the preserved lymph node specimen by means of an in-situ hybridisation method detected human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Preserved prostatic tissue from a resection performed in January 1980 on the same patient was also found to be HIV positive.

AIDS existed in Australia as early as July 1981, around the time of the publication of the first American case reports. Whether this represents an isolated case in a man who progressed rapidly because of his relatively advanced age, or whether HIV was present earlier in Australia than previously thought, remains unanswered.