Our cytokine analyses showed that inflammatory cytokines IL-6, IL-8, MIP-1α, MIP-1β and IFN-γ (an inducer of IP-10) were strongly positively correlated with each other, after adjusting for age and the sampling days from disease onset, and supports previous studies on their collective role as biomarkers for influenza severity18,20–23. The gene discussed is CCL3; the disease is influenza.