The article is built after an outlook from the field of analysis of social policies within Brazil's Unified Health System (SUS), focusing health policies for women and AIDS control policies in order to interpret women's vulnerabilities in the context of HIV and AIDS. It identifies the limits as well as prevention and care strategies adopted by SUS to fight HIV/AIDS, with the adoption of the ideology of the minimal state. The document research conducted in Brazil is a study on how the feminist movement, notably the Feminist Health Network, engaged with the AIDS epidemic through a revision and analysis of their position papers, minutes and other documents, including public policies. This was done from a historical and critical perspective, covering the period from 1992 to 2008. The study interprets the strategic choices of the feminist health movement from the women's health policy and the HIV/AIDS policy. This paper's perspective is that the meanings of feminist action against the AIDS epidemic are beyond the health field. It exposed progress and limits of feminism against the AIDS epidemic inside a neoliberal capitalist state logic based on patriarchal norms.
HIV; feminism; health policies; gender-class-race; state and civil society; social movement