Nonetheless, an early evaluation of the 2009 pandemic, with limitations acknowledged by its authors, suggested that border screening may have led to delays of 7 to 12 days in the establishment of local transmission [27] . We accept that border screening will have detected a limited number of influenza cases, but suggest that many more cases will have been missed than were detected. In Australia, at least, it is likely that border screening was implemented after the virus had entered the country [18] . On balance, we conclude that border screening was as ineffective as it should have been expected to be.