In the past 30 years, dental health in Australia has undergone a marked improvement. This improvement has been paralleled by a significant change in attitudes to many aspects of dental health and in consequent behaviour. The caries experience of the younger Australian is now about one-third of that of his older counterpart. Two-thirds of the Australian population drink fluoridated water and there is widespread use of fluoridated dentifrices. Hence, the DMFT of 12 year olds is already approaching the target level of 3 for the year 2000, compared with a level of over 10 just 30 years ago. Edentulousness is still a problem, as evidenced by a rate of 68 per cent in those aged 45-64. With the increased retention of teeth in the young there is every expectation that this rate will be reduced significantly with time. Among the problem groups the aboriginal population, particularly those described as ‘transitional’, show all the ravages created by very high sucrose intake. To formulate plans to combat this a study of aboriginal dental health has been proposed.