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Background: Influenza poses a major public health challenge in South-East Asia Region (SEAR). To address the challenge, there is a need to generate contextual evidence that could inform policy makers and program managers for response preparedness and impact mitigation. The World Health Organization has identified priority areas across five streams for research evidence generation at a global level (WHO Public Health Research Agenda). Stream 1 focuses on research for reducing the risk of emergence, Stream 2 on limiting the spread, Stream 3 on minimizing the impact, Stream 4 on optimizing the treatment and Stream 5 on promoting public health tools and technologies for Influenza. However, evidence generation from SEAR has been arguably low and needs a relook for alignment with priorities. This study aimed to undertake a bibliometric analysis of medical literature on Influenza over the past 21 years to identify gaps in research evidence and for identifying major areas for focusing with a view to provide recommendations to member states and SEAR office for prioritizing avenues for future research., Methods: We searched Scopus, PubMed, Embase, and Cochrane databases in August 2021. We identified studies on influenza published from the 11 countries in WHO SEAR in the date range of 1 January 2000-31 December 2021. Data was retrieved, tagged and analyzed based on the WHO priority streams for Influenza, member states, study design and type of research. Bibliometric analysis was done on Vosviewer., Findings: We included a total of 1,641 articles (Stream 1: n  = 307; Stream 2: n  = 516; Stream 3: n  = 470; Stream 4: n  = 309; Stream 5: n  = 227). Maximum number of publications were seen in Stream 2, i.e., limiting the spread of pandemic, zoonotic, and seasonal epidemic influenza which majorly included transmission, spread of virus at global and local levels and public health measures to limit the transmission. The highest number of publications was from India ( n  = 524) followed by Thailand ( n  = 407), Indonesia ( n  = 214) and Bangladesh ( n  = 158). Bhutan ( n  = 10), Maldives ( n  = 1), Democratic People's Republic of Korea ( n  = 1), and Timor-Leste ( n  = 3) had the least contribution in Influenza research. The top-most journal was PloS One which had the maximum number of influenza articles ( n  = 94) published from SEAR countries. Research that generated actionable evidence, i.e., implementation and intervention related topics were less common. Similarly, research on pharmaceutical interventions and on innovations was low. SEAR member states had inconsistent output across the five priority research streams, and there was a much higher scope and need for collaborative research. Basic science research showed declining trends and needed reprioritization., Interpretation: While a priority research agenda has been set for influenza at the global level through the WHO Global Influenza Program since 2009, and subsequently revisited in 2011 and again in 2016-2017, a structured contextualized approach to guide actionable evidence generation activities in SEAR has been lacking. In the backset of the Global Influenza Strategy 2019-2030 and the COVID-19 pandemic, attuning research endeavors in SEAR could help in improved pandemic influenza preparedness planning. There is a need to prioritize contextually relevant research themes within priority streams. Member states must inculcate a culture of within and inter-country collaboration to produce evidence that has regional as well as global value., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2023 Ranjan Wijesinghe, Sharma, Vaishnav, Mukherjee, Pawar, Mohapatra, Buddha, Ceniza Salvador and Kakkar.)

Background: In Asia, rotavirus accounts for approximately 45% of admissions due to acute gastroenteritis in children <5 years, and causes about 145,000 deaths every year. We studied the distribution of rotavirus strains from Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and Nepal during 2009-2015., Methods: Stool samples collected from children <5 years of age hospitalized with acute diarrhea in the three sites and positive for rotavirus antigen by enzyme immunoassay (EIA) were sent to the Christian Medical College, Vellore from 2009 to 2015. G and P typing of rotavirus strains were performed using reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR)., Result: Of the 2354 EIA positive samples tested, G12P[8] (36.8%), G1P[8] (30.1%), and G12P[6] (41.3%) were the most common strains isolated from Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and Nepal respectively., Conclusion: There was substantial diversity of rotavirus genotypes, and continued surveillance in developing countries of Asia will help in understanding the epidemiology of rotavirus before and after introduction of vaccines., (Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)