The paper aims to estimate the extent to which migrants are contributing to AIDS or tuberculosis (TB) mortality among rural sub-district populations. The Agincourt (South Africa) health and socio-demographic surveillance system provided comprehensive data on vital and migration events between 1994 and 2006. AIDS and TB cause-deleted life expectancy, and crude death rates by gender, migration status and period were computed. The annualised crude death rate almost tripled from 5∙39 [95% CI 5∙13-5∙65] to 15∙10 [95% CI 14∙62-15∙59] per 1000 over the years 1994-2006. The contribution of AIDS and TB in returned migrants to the increase in crude death rate was 78∙7% [95% CI 77∙4-80∙1] for males and 44∙4% [95% CI 43∙2-46∙1] for females. So, in a typical South African setting dependent on labour migration for rural livelihoods, the contribution of returned migrants, many infected with AIDS and TB, to the burden of disease is high.