[Truncated abstract] Around 50,000 hip and knee replacements are performed every year in Australia and this number has been increasing by around 13% annually since 1998 (Transplantation Society 2006). The incidence and number of revision surgery has increased by a similar proportion. Autogenous bone or allograft is still the gold standard grafting material and is currently used in a variety of reconstructive surgical procedures. The use of any allograft material carries with it the risk of transfer of disease from donor to recipient. These tissues can transmit the same viral and bacterial infections as blood, and the products of a single donation may be transplanted to several recipients. In contrast to blood, musculoskeletal tissues may come from surgical and cadaveric donation. Overall, the prevention of infection relies on the maintenance of rigid protocols for procurement, donor and allograft testing, secondary sterilisation, and the adherence to internal safety standards within the tissue banks. This thesis aims to determine the risk of viral infection among musculoskeletal tissue donors in Australia. We retrieved and analysed data retrospectively from three large tissue banks in Australia (Perth, Queensland, Victoria). This includes 12,415 musculoskeletal tissue donors, 10,937 of which are surgical donors and 1,478 of which are deceased donors, for the period of 1993 -2004. This data was analysed to determine the prevalence and incidence of viral infections such as human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), hepatitis B virus (HBV), hepatitis C virus (HCV) and human T-lymphotropic virus (HTLV) in musculoskeletal allografts. The results indicate that the risk of viral infection from musculoskeletal tissue transplantation in Australia is low. ... The results indicate that the overall prevalence of screened transfusion-transmitted viral infections did not vary significantly for musculoskeletal donors over the study period, despite falling in the general population and first-time blood donors. In tissue donors, HIV incidence significantly decreased over time, and HBV decreased significantly during 1999-2001; however, there was an apparent increase in the estimated incidence of HCV in 2002-2004 compared with earlier years. Furthermore the residual risk estimate of HIV in the period 2002-2004 has declined 5-fold compared to estimates in the period 1993-1995. This is perhaps due to greater awareness of high risk behaviours among donors, improvement in donor recruitment and an overall decrease in infection levels in the general population. Musculoskeletal tissue is second only to blood as the most frequent transplanted human tissue. Viral infection is a potential complication of tissue transplantation. In this thesis the rates of HIV, HBV, HCV and HTV infection in musculoskeletal donors in Australia were identified and then compared with results in published data from Canada, Scotland and the United States. The study also compared that result with first-time blood donors because they have satisfied similar donor selection criteria (Galea et al. 2006). The results indicate that prevalence and incidence estimates for viral infection in Australian tissue donors are higher than those in blood donors. This was also reported in studies from other countries. Accordingly, it is crucial that viral prevalence and incidence be monitored to evaluate the safety of tissue supply and to improve donor selection processes.