The Importance of Blood Transfusions in the 1980s

The first case of transfusion associated AIDS was reported actually in San Francisco down the street from where I live at UCSF in 1981. By 1987 there were about 37,000 AIDS cases identified about 3% were due to transfusion. So it really was a challenging time in the sense that this infectious disease could be transmitted through blood. But we didn't have really an adequate way to test for it until 1985 when the first anti-HIV test was licensed and implemented for donor screening.