Jamil Ahmed  ( Department of Community Health Sciences, Aga Khan University )
Babar T. Shaikh  ( Department of Community Health Sciences, Aga Khan University )

Madam, Research in health has brought great achievements ranging from elimination of deadly diseases, such as small pox, to doubling of overall life expectancies in most of the countries. Despite this, the health of the populations at large, has been suffering from problems that are remediable with the sharing of the global scientific evidence. Unfortunately this has not happened for most of the time in the past ¹

The health systems in different regions of the world have different issues to handle. Some countries are experiencing the demographic, epidemiologic and economic transitions and may take more time to converge with the developed world. The health policy in these countries is mostly unstable and heavily driven by the international agendas. The growing disparities between and within the countries have made the developing countries rely heavily on the evidence generated by the developed world. Financing health related research in the developing countries is lumped with high expectations to oblige their agendas and priorities. Therefore, the knowledge generated by research in these countries is not incorporated in the policies and practice and life goes on unchanged.^1,2 More than often, the health systems researchers are faced with the dilemma of health research priorities of the developing world. This intricate and multi-faceted inquiry can be answered only through the sharing of information and cooperation between the scientific communities ³

In this epoch of globalization and internationalization of health, where international and regional borders are fading out by virtue of international agreements and treaties, health sector in developing countries suffer the most. Moreover, the involvement of stakeholders such as economists, educationists, politicians and media personnel is pivotal to initiate a strong advocacy campaign for understanding the international health research agenda and there on investing in health systems research in our own setting ⁴ Finally, what are the priorities for health research? Who will set these priorities and who will address the question of allocating resources to the major health issues that the world is facing. In this regard, doing the precise needs assessment by involving communities at least for collecting the evidence should not to be ignored. Only the systematic and evidence based priority setting, building research capacity and understanding the specific needs of various developing countries will bring fruitful results to end the yawning disparities within and between the countries ⁵ Nevertheless, international community has a definite role to play in this scenario.

 Jamil Ahmed, Babar T. Shaikh
  Department of Community Health Sciences, Aga Khan University,
  Karachi .

References
1. Bloom BR, La Montagne JR, Simonsen L. Priorities for global research and development of interventions. In: Disease control priorities in developing countries. 2nd ed. Jamison DT, Breman JG, Measham AR, Alleyne G, Claeson M, Evans DB, et al., editors. Washington: Oxford University Press; 2006. pp. 103-118.
2. Nuyens Y. Setting priorities for health research: lessons from low- and middle-income countries. Bulletin of the World Health Organization 2007; 85: 319-21.
3. Mills EJ, Robinson J, Attaran A, Clarke M, Singh S, Upshur RE, et al. Sharing evidence on humanitarian relief. Br Med J 2005; 331: 1485-6.
4. Shaikh BT. Understanding social determinants of health seeking behaviours, providing a rational framework for health policy and systems development. J   Pak Med Assoc 2008; 58: 33-36.
5. Aldrich R, Bonevski B, Wilson A. A case study on determining and responding to health managers' priorities for research to assist health service decision making. Australian Health Review 2006; 30: 435-41.