A 43-year-old security guard in Venezuela was pulled alive from the ruins of a shopping center Thursday after being trapped beneath the rubble for eight days following twin earthquakes that killed more than 2,200 people.

Hernán Alberto Gil Flores was rescued from the collapsed basement of the Galerías Playa Grande shopping center in the coastal state of La Guaira, where he had been trapped since the powerful earthquakes struck June 24.

«When we found him, he asked us not to tell his wife that he was alive, just in case he wouldn’t make it,» Costa Rican Red Cross rescuer Minyar Collado told The Associated Press.

Rescuers first made contact with Gil Flores over the weekend after detecting signs of life beneath the debris.

BOY, 2, PULLED ALIVE FROM RUBBLE SIX DAYS AFTER VENEZUELA’S DEVASTATING TWIN EARTHQUAKES

Gil Flores was working an overnight shift when the first earthquake struck. While much of the building collapsed around him, his small security booth stayed intact, protecting him from the falling concrete and leaving enough space for him to survive.

Rescue crews worked through aftershocks, torrential rain and unstable rubble to reach him. They used a telescopic camera to communicate with Gil Flores and lowered water and liquid nutrients through a narrow shaft to keep him alive during the final days of the rescue.

Rescue workers carry Hernán Alberto Gil Flores Gil after he was pulled from the rubble eight days after he was trapped by twin earthquakes that struck Catia La Mar, Venezuela, Thursday, July 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)

His wife, Gusbimar González, said the family’s despair turned to hope after rescuers reached her husband.

«When I learned he was alive, I saw a ray of light in the darkness,» she told the AP. The couple has two children, ages 8 and 10.

Video from the scene showed rescuers carrying Gil Flores on a stretcher covered with an orange tarp through cheering crowds before loading him into a Red Cross ambulance. Members of the Costa Rican Red Cross hugged one another after the rescue.

Rescue workers carry Hernán Alberto Gil Flores after he was pulled from the rubble eight days after he was trapped by twin earthquakes that struck Catia La Mar, Venezuela, Thursday, July 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)

The operation was led by Chilean firefighters and included search-and-rescue teams from Costa Rica, the United States, Portugal, Mexico and other countries.

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The shopping center collapsed after twin earthquakes measuring magnitudes 7.2 and 7.5 struck northern Venezuela on June 24, destroying tens of thousands of buildings, killing more than 2,200 people and injuring more than 11,000 others.

Gil Flores’ rescue offered a rare moment of hope after days of devastation.

On Tuesday, emergency workers rescued a 2-year-old boy who had been trapped beneath the rubble for six days.

A man wearing a Barcelona soccer team jersey searches through earthquake rubble in La Guaira, Venezuela, Wednesday, July 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

On Saturday, the U.S. State Department shared video showing American search-and-rescue teams pulling a 9-month-old girl alive from a collapsed structure. The infant was rescued along with her mother, the State Department told Fox News Digital. Both suffered only minor injuries, according to the rescue team.

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The U.S. government has mobilized $150 million in humanitarian aid to help Venezuela respond to the disaster.

Fox News Digital’s Michael Sinkewicz and Peter D’Abrosca, along with The Associated Press, contributed to this report.

“Las infecciones de transmisión sexual llevan 10 años subiendo y alcanzaron en 2024 (últimos año con datos epidemiológicos definitivos) su nivel más alto jamás registrado. Si no se tratan, estas infecciones pueden provocar complicaciones severas, como dolores crónicos e infertilidad. En el caso de la sífilis, problemas cardiovasculares y neurológicos. Lo más preocupante es que entre 2023 y 2024 vemos que casi se duplica la sífilis congenital, cuando la infección pasa directamente a los recién nacidos, dando pie a complicaciones de por vida”. Las palabras de Bruno Ciancio, alto cargo del Centro Europeo de Control y Prevención de Enfermedades (ECDC, en sus siglas en inglés), marcan el informe de este año de su agencia, que se hizo famosa durante la pandemia del coronavirus.

Los datos del ECDC muestran que las infecciones de transmisión sexual registraron niveles récord en Europa en 2024, sobre todo por el aumento de la gonorrea y la sífilis. En 2024 hubo notificaciones de 106.331 casos de gorronea, un incremento del 303% con respecto a 2015. La sífilis aumentó más del doble hasta 45.577 casos en el mismo período. Enfermedades que se consideraban prácticamente erradicadas vuelven a pasearse por Europa. ¿A qué se debe? La ECDC señala varias razones, pero sobre todo una: las generaciones menores de 40 años han perdido el miedo a enfermedades sexuales que el VIH provocó en las generaciones mayores.

La ECDC señala otras razones, que van desde la reducción de programas de prevención en algunos países europeos hasta cambios en los comportamientos sexuales pasando por la cada vez mayor popularidad de la mezcla de sexo con el uso de sustancias psicoactivas, la reducción del acceso a medicamentos contra esas infecciones y a un aumento de la desigualdad en el acceso a los cuidados médicos.

El aumento en la incidencia de infecciones como la sífilis y la gonorrea se daba tradicionalmente en Europa (y en otros continentes) en momentos como guerras, migraciones masivas, extrema pobreza y otras alternaciones socioeconómicas graves. La primera gran crisis de sífilis en Europa coincidió con la campaña militar italiana contra el rey francés Carlos VIII en 1494 y 1495. Decenas de miles de soldados viajaban junto a mercenarios, mercaderes y prostitutas, dando pie a condiciones en las que era muy fácil que se extendieran las infecciones.

Esas infecciones volvieron a crecer en cada gran campaña militar y, ya en el siglo XIX, cuando la revolución industrial hizo crecer las ciudades, generó masas de migrantes hacia ellas y condiciones de vida insalubres. En esa época la incidencia de la gonorrea llegó al 20% de la población de algunas ciudades europeas. Durante la Primera Guerra Mundial las enfermedades venéreas llegaron a afectar a casi 20.000 soldados estadounidenses cada día.

El descubrimiento de la penicilina, recuerda la ECDC en 1928 y su uso masivo a partir de 1940, y la llegada de los antibióticos después de la Segunda Guerra Mundial cambiaron los tratamientos. Si antes un enfermo de gonorrea podía pasar unos 30 días hospitalizado, desde que los antibióticos se generalizaron ese tratamiento dura cinco días y no necesita hospitalización. Tras la Segunda Guerra Mundial las tasas de incidencia de la gonorrea y la sífilis cayeron con fuerza en Europa, por esos antibióticos, por la popularización de los métodos anticonceptivos y por la mejora en los sistemas de salud.

La revolución sexual de finales de los años 60 del siglo pasado provocó un ligero aumento en la incidencia de las enfermedades de transmisión sexual, que volvieron a caer cuando en los años 80 estalló la epidemia del VIH. Se hicieron masivas campañas de salud sexual y se controlaron las infecciones. Pero sobre todo, cientos de millones de personas tomaron conciencia del peligro de esas enfermedades. El VIH mataba gente joven, saludable y no había tratamiento disponible para frenar la enfermedad. Las campañas para popularizar el uso del condón de latex fueron masivas. Los españoles todavía recuerdan el “Póntelo, pónselo”.

A partir del cambio de siglo la tendencia cambió. La incipiente popularidad del chemsex (sexo acompañado del uso de sustancias psicoactivas) y los ajustes de gasto en los sistemas sanitarios tras la crisis financiera de 2008 empezaron a hacer que las infecciones crecieran. El fin de la pandemia del coronavirus provocó otro aumento en casi toda Europa, que se ha ido acelerando en los últimos años. La ECDC señala incluso a la aparición de las aplicaciones móviles de citas.

Former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke recently told a conservative media outlet that he agrees with a Democratic congressional nominee on an unlikely issue: interracial marriage.

Darializa Avila Chevalier, who recently won the Democratic primary in New York’s 13th Congressional District, attracted controversy on the campaign trail for a deleted 2019 social media post where she attacked «Black men» and «Arab men» for «fetishizing ugly colonizer women.» 

The sentiment won praise from Duke.

«Well, I think that people have the right to preserve their particular heritage,» the former KKK leader told the Washington Free Beacon in a phone interview. «And if she’s concerned about preserving her heritage if it’s Somali, or whatever she is, she’s certainly got the right to do that.» 

MAMDANI-BACKED SOCIALIST IN HOT SEAT AGAIN OVER DELETED POSTS PRAISING COMMUNISM, MARXISM: ‘CRAZYPANTS’

Chevalier identifies as Afro-Latina. She was also part of a cohort of socialist candidates endorsed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani who swept New York’s June Democratic primary elections.

Duke served in the Louisiana House of Representatives from 1989 to 1992 after years of involvement in extremist politics. He was grand wizard of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan from 1974 to 1980, a title used by the organization for its national leader.

Even before Duke went public with his praise for Chevalier, some political observers were making connections between the two.

«Chevalier is our David Duke,» one unnamed Democrat told journalist Mark Halperin in June. «She is poisoning the possibility of a Democratic majority.»  

JAMES CARVILLE SAYS SOCIALIST DEMOCRAT SHOULDN’T BE IN THE PARTY, CALLS HER VIEWS ‘A BRIDGE TOO FAR’

Former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke recently told a conservative media outlet that he agrees with a Democratic congressional nominee on an unlikely issue: interracial marriage. (Adam Gray/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Former Republican congressman Peter Meijer said Monday on X that «the difference is that the modern Democratic Party would never do to Chevalier what the GOP did to David Duke.»

Duke infamously ran as a Republican in the 1991 Louisiana gubernatorial election after placing second in the state’s nonpartisan jungle primary. Amid national controversy, the GOP refused to endorse Duke, backing Democrat Edwin Edwards instead.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, meanwhile, congratulated Chevalier on her primary victory in a Saturday social media post. New York’s 13th Congressional District is heavily Democratic, making it very likely that Chevalier will be elected to the House of Representatives in November.

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In this Saturday, July 8, 2017 photo, Klan members salute during a KKK rally in Justice Park, in Charlottesville, Va. The number of Ku Klux Klan chapters in the U.S. is plummeting as a new generation of khaki-clad racists rejects hoods and robes for a «hipper» brand of hate, according to a report Wednesday by an organization that tracks far-right extremists. (AP Photo/Steve Helber) ( )

Duke has had kind words for a number of Democrats in recent years, citing their shared distaste for Israel.

«By defiance to (Zionist occupied government) Ilhan Omar is NOW the most important Member of the US Congress!» Duke wrote on his website in 2019 after Rep. Ilhan Omar was accused of implying that Jewish lawmakers have a dual loyalty to Israel.

Duke has called Jews «a blight» who should «go into the ashcan of history.»

The one-time KKK leader also praised Mamdani in his interview with the Free Beacon.

«I think that the new mayor of New York was a step forward,» Duke said, according to the outlet, though he noted he disagrees with him on immigration policy. «His views on Israel are critical, because there’s no more important political issue than the fact that a tiny minority of America … the oligarchs of the Jewish people, that they are controlling our foreign policy.»

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The episode highlights a potential political vulnerability for some progressive Democrats, who face mounting scrutiny over allegations of antisemitism within their ranks. Duke’s praise for Chevalier — and his support for other Democrats who have drawn accusations of antisemitism — give critics in both parties a new opening to attack the Democratic Party’s young and ascendant socialist wing.

The Chevalier campaign did not respond to a request for comment when reached by Fox News Digital Thursday.