Proponents of the one-health initiative have recognised the need to move the concept from vision to implementation. 1 The paper by Richard Coker and colleagues2 admirably draws attention to the importance of, and possible mechanisms for, incorporation of a systemic perspective into one-health discussions about changes in human, livestock, and wildlife populations and their effect on infectious diseases. We welcome the development of a conceptual framework for informing these discussions and acknowledge its usefulness in unifying perspectives from animal, wildlife, and human sectors to guide assessments of specific sets of onehealth interventions. We also agree that research agendas are needed for emerging zoonoses, informed by local needs and priorities. Although a focus on policy research is important to design and implement effective one-health interventions, the knowledge gaps in one health are widespread. We feel that systematic identification of these gaps is important in any one-health priority-setting process. We provide an example from a research-priority-setting exercise for prevention and control of zoonoses in India, 3 undertaken by our group, that justifies some of Coker and colleagues’2 assertions. We suggest alternative perspectives that can be explored during development of a comprehensive one-health research agenda.

We consulted a broad range of stakeholders from different disciplinary backgrounds to identify priority zoonotic diseases in India. We then classified research options that could help to address the gaps in knowledge based on criteria developed by the Child Health and Nutrition Research Initiative4 and