Education gives young people tools to make informed decisions
En Venezuela, donde el silencio sobre la sexualidad ha sido confundido durante mucho tiempo con protección, una organización civil lleva más de tres décadas documentando lo que ese silencio cuesta: infecciones de transmisión sexual en ascenso entre adolescentes, una de cada tres jóvenes que reporta haber vivido violencia sexual, y embarazos que interrumpen trayectorias de vida antes de que comiencen. Nubia Laguna, coordinadora de Niña Madre, sostiene que la educación sexual integral no es una amenaza a la inocencia juvenil, sino su única defensa real. Lo que está en juego no es solo la salud pública, sino la capacidad de una generación para conocerse, protegerse y elegir.
- Las infecciones de transmisión sexual avanzan silenciosamente entre adolescentes venezolanos: el 7% de las embarazadas tamizadas resultó positivo para sífilis, y muchas jóvenes no buscan atención porque los síntomas no se sienten urgentes.
- Una de cada tres adolescentes que acudió a las clínicas especializadas de Niña Madre reveló haber sufrido violencia sexual, una cifra que no refleja un caso extremo sino lo que emerge cuando se crea un espacio seguro para hablar.
- El tabú cultural que rodea la educación sexual —el temor de que informar equivale a incitar— es, según Laguna, precisamente lo que deja a los jóvenes sin herramientas para protegerse o reconocer una violación a sus derechos.
- Niña Madre opera clínicas amigables para adolescentes, programas de educación sexual en escuelas y comunidades, y acompañamiento psicosocial para madres jóvenes, pero la cobertura sigue siendo insuficiente frente a la magnitud nacional del problema.
- La organización advierte que ninguna intervención es sostenible si no llega también al hogar: sin familias informadas y sensibilizadas, el trabajo clínico y educativo encuentra un muro donde más se necesita.
Nubia Laguna lleva más de treinta años mirando de frente lo que muchos prefieren no ver. Como coordinadora de Niña Madre, una organización civil venezolana dedicada a la salud adolescente, ha observado cómo las infecciones de transmisión sexual —VPH, sífilis, VIH— se extienden entre jóvenes que con frecuencia no saben que las tienen, o que sabiéndolo, no buscan atención porque no sienten urgencia. Entre 2023 y 2024, el 7% de las adolescentes embarazadas tamizadas por el programa resultó positivo para sífilis. El número es pequeño en apariencia, pero señala algo más profundo: la infección se normaliza, se vuelve invisible.
La violencia agrava el cuadro. Cuando Niña Madre abrió clínicas especializadas para adolescentes entre 2024 y 2025, el 33% de las jóvenes atendidas reportó haber vivido violencia sexual. No es una excepción: es lo que aparece cuando existe un espacio donde es posible hablar.
Laguna desafía con claridad una creencia que ha moldeado la política pública venezolana durante años: que educar sobre sexualidad impulsa a los jóvenes a tener relaciones sexuales. Ella sostiene lo contrario. La educación integral entrega lenguaje, conocimiento de derechos y capacidad de decisión. Es el tabú, no la información, lo que deja a los adolescentes expuestos.
Desde 1990, Niña Madre implementa programas de educación sexual en escuelas, comunidades y hogares, abordando no solo reproducción y anticoncepción, sino también la identificación del abuso, la violencia de género y el machismo estructural. En alianza con el Fondo de Población de las Naciones Unidas, opera clínicas donde los jóvenes reciben atención médica, orientación y acompañamiento emocional. Los resultados, cuando ese modelo funciona, son distintos.
Pero el alcance es limitado. La organización también trabaja con madres adolescentes después del parto: apoyo psicosocial, continuidad educativa, formación vocacional en textiles, gastronomía y tecnología. Sin embargo, Laguna es enfática: nada de esto es suficiente si no llega a las familias. La educación que no entra al hogar encuentra su límite justo donde más se necesita.
Nubia Laguna sits across from the microphone at Radio Fe y Alegría Noticias with a problem she cannot ignore. As coordinator of Niña Madre, a Venezuelan civil organization that has worked with adolescents for more than three decades, she has watched sexually transmitted infections spread through the country's youth population with accelerating speed. The infections are real and specific: human papillomavirus, syphilis, HIV. But the deeper problem, she believes, is not medical alone—it is educational, emotional, and structural.
Between 2023 and 2024, Laguna's organization screened pregnant adolescents and young women through a maternal health program. Seven percent tested positive for syphilis on VDRL screening. That number sits quietly in the data, but it points to something larger: young people are contracting these infections and often do not know it, or knowing it, do not seek treatment because they feel no immediate danger, no urgent symptoms. The infections become normalized, absorbed into the texture of daily life as something that happens to other people, or something that will resolve on its own.
The violence compounds the medical crisis. Between 2024 and 2025, when Niña Madre opened specialized clinics designed specifically for adolescents, one-third of the young women who came through reported having experienced sexual violence. Thirty-three percent. The number is not an outlier or a worst-case scenario—it is what the organization found when it created a space where adolescents felt safe enough to speak.
Laguna's argument, stated plainly and without apology, challenges a fear that has shaped Venezuelan public health policy for years. Many people believe that teaching adolescents about sexuality will encourage them to have sex, to become promiscuous. She rejects this entirely. Education, she insists, does the opposite. It gives young people the language to understand their bodies, the knowledge of their rights, and the capacity to make decisions that are informed rather than desperate or coerced. The taboo itself, she suggests, is what leaves adolescents vulnerable.
Niña Madre has been running comprehensive sex education programs since 1990—in schools, in communities, in homes. The curriculum addresses not only reproduction and contraception but also the recognition and prevention of child sexual abuse, sexual violence, gender-based violence, and the machismo that underpins much of it. The organization works alongside the United Nations Population Fund to operate specialized clinics where adolescents receive medical care, counseling, and emotional support from professionals trained to work with this age group. When that happens—when a young person receives clear information, emotional accompaniment, and access to friendly services—the outcomes change. The results are, as Laguna says, completely different.
But the reach is limited. These services, however effective, are insufficient to meet the demand across Venezuela. The crisis does not end with pregnancy or infection. Adolescent mothers face desertion from school, barriers to healthcare, and the weight of social judgment. Niña Madre has built programs to address what comes after: psychosocial support, counseling, accompaniment designed to help young mothers continue their education and construct a future. The organization runs vocational training initiatives, including a textile program called Hilando that teaches adolescents to create and sell clothing made from textile waste, alongside culinary and technology training.
Yet none of this works, Laguna emphasizes, without the family. If parents and guardians are not informed, not sensitized to the reality their children face, the work collapses. The education must reach beyond the clinic and the classroom into the home, into the conversations that shape how adolescents understand their own bodies and their own worth. That is the work still ahead.
Citações Notáveis
Education about sexuality gives adolescents tools to take informed decisions, not encouragement to be promiscuous— Nubia Laguna, coordinator of Niña Madre
When an adolescent receives clear information, emotional support, and access to friendly services, the results are completely different— Nubia Laguna
A Conversa do Hearth Outra perspectiva sobre a história
When you say seven percent of pregnant adolescents tested positive for syphilis, what does that tell you about what's happening before they become pregnant?
It tells me that infections are spreading silently. Many of these young women didn't know they had it. They had no symptoms, so they never sought treatment. By the time we screened them, the infection was already there, already part of their body.
And the thirty-three percent reporting sexual violence—does that number surprise you?
No. What surprises me is that we found it at all. We only discovered it because we created a space where adolescents felt safe enough to say it. The violence was always there. We just weren't asking.
You push back hard against the idea that sex education makes adolescents more promiscuous. Why do you think that fear exists?
Because adults are afraid of adolescent sexuality itself. They think if we don't talk about it, it won't happen. But it does happen. And when it happens without knowledge, without tools, without someone to talk to—that's when the damage occurs.
Your programs have been running since 1990. What have you learned about what actually works?
That comprehensive means everything. Not just contraceptives. Not just biology. You need medical care, emotional support, someone who understands what it's like to be an adolescent in Venezuela right now. And you need the family involved. Without that, the work falls apart.
The services you describe sound intensive and expensive. How do you scale that?
That's the question we're asking too. Right now, we can't. The demand is far greater than what we can provide. We need more resources, more trained professionals, more clinics. Until that happens, many adolescents will continue to fall through.