ABSTRACT
The threat of the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) to women in Southeast Asia is largely the result of neglect. Women's risks of infection with the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) entered the institutional and public consciousness at a relatively late stage in the pandemic (Panos, 1990) and there is an ongoing resistance to seeing AIDS and other sexually transmissible diseases (STDs) as reproductive health issues. On the other hand, the "window of opportunity" (Petersen, 1992:44) for introducing large-scale prevention programs before a critical mass of people were infected with HIV has effectively been lost with an estimated 2.5 million Asians believed to be HIV-positive (WHO, 1994). While the reasons for this neglect are beyond the scope of this chapter, the results must be set against the global context in which the AIDS threat is constructed and responses developed. 1
