'New bottle, but old wine': from family planning to HIV/AIDS in post-Doi Moi Vietnam.

This paper begins with an observation that during the past two decades HIV/AIDS has emerged as a new public health priority in Vietnam and has commanded increasing attention and resources from both the government and the donor community. By juxtaposing HIV/AIDS with family planning another social and health priority that preceded and overlapped with HIV/AIDS for a large part of the 1990s we show two major gaps that have undermined both programmes. One is the lack of a strong civil society that could have served as advocates for change especially outside the government and the donor community. The other is the desire for control of womens bodies and sexuality that has been driven by the ever shifting project of nation building. We argue that these two major gaps represent more continuity than discontinuity in the way sexual and reproductive health issues are approached in Vietnam despite the seeming shift in priority that the emergence of HIV/AIDS suggests. (authors)