In the original paper describing the disease, published in 1948, the first patients presented in 1939 in the Bairnsdale District of Victoria, Australia.[1] In December 1935, there had been terrible floods in the district, when all road and rail links had been cut and there had been considerable destruction of property. In Uganda, Barker examined cases of M. ulcerans infection (Buruli ulcer disease) occurring in the Busoga region on the east side of the Victoria Nile, north of Lake Victoria.[4] Although cases were known in the other parts of the country, cases were unknown in the district before 1965. Barker postulated that the outbreak was related to the unprecedented flooding of the lakes of Uganda between 1962 and 1964 as a result of heavy rainfall.