A similar analysis was recently performed using dated whole genome influenza A(H3N2) sequences from New York, New Zealand and Australia, downloaded from publicly available databases, in an attempt to test two competing hypotheses: whether seasonal influenza A(H3N2) viruses continuously 'migrate' around the world, particularly between Northern and Southern hemispheres; or whether the virus remains 'latent' in one location and reactivates each year to produce the familiar pattern of influenza seasonality [19] . As these authors stated, ideally, whole genomes should be used for more accurate phylogenetic analyses of influenza virus as has been reported previously [14, 15] , with at least one good reason for this being the potentially misleading conclusions caused by influenza viral HA and NA gene reassortments [19] . However, many laboratories worldwide do not have the resources to perform whole genome sequencing, which is expensive -particularly those in subtropical and tropical regions from where such influenza sequence data is significantly lacking.