¹ Syrian Center for Tobacco Studies, Syria
² Health Related Information Dissemination Amongst Youth, India
³ All India Institute of Medical Sciences, India
⁴ Sichuan University, China

Correspondence to:
Wasim Maziak
PO Box 16542, Aleppo, Syrian Arab Republic; maziak@scts-sy.org

Keywords: developing countries; Fogarty International Center

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

A question central to the theme of this supplement to Tobacco Control is "why seed tobacco research in developing countries?" Arguably, research done in advanced institutions can provide answers to most questions regarding the hazards of smoking and ways to combat its spread. Indeed, do we need to repeat in developing countries expensive and lengthy cohort studies about the link between smoking and cancer? Or should we investigate addiction neurobiology in every population to better understand and treat it? Obviously, there may be differences in cancer risk or addiction neurobiology between populations, but are these of a sufficient magnitude and relevance to tobacco control to justify establishing such costly research programmes in developing countries. These are justified arguments, yet the question at hand is of much broader nature.

LOCAL DATA ESSENTIAL
We have learned through the years that the smoking epidemic follows a predictable course in most populations, thus requiring fairly similar intervention . . . [Full text of this article]