A purported news report claims that Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte approved the release of P20,000 (USD $400) to all recipients of the Philippines’ Social Security System (SSS) to help them through the novel coronavirus pandemic.
The report’s Tagalog-language headline translates to English as: "P20,000 For All Members of SSS to Help in Covid-19. Approved by the President"., Embedded in the report is a video which bears the SSS logo and states: “SSS TALK”. The video plays for three seconds and then prompts users to share it on Facebook., "Below is a screenshot of the share alert, which bears the same claim and shows a photo of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte:", The novel coronavirus, COVID-19, has killed more than 16,000\xa0people worldwide since it was first detected in the Chinese city of\xa0Wuhan in late 2019, according to\xa0World Health Organization (WHO)\xa0data on March 25., Multiple Facebook posts have also shared photos of the report\xa0here, here and here\xa0with a similar claim., The claim is false., “Informing the public it is NOT TRUE that P20,000 will be given to all SSS members to help with Covid-19," the agency said in this Tagalog-language Facebook post on March 18, 2020., Below is a screenshot of the SSS statement, which contains a photo of the false report stamped “FAKE NEWS”:, The Philippines did announce on March 12, 2020 that the SSS would\xa0pay up to P20,000 in unemployment benefits to workers who lost their jobs due to the pandemic, according to a statement from the Department of Finance., But the government has not said that a P20,000 lump sum will be distributed to all SSS recipients., The website that published the false report is also not a reliable or legitimate source of news. The site’s Home, About Us, and Contact Us pages are largely empty and the site does not include any bylines or sourcing information., , Copyright © AFP 2017-2020.  All rights reserved.  Users can access and consult this website and use the share features available for personal, private, and non-commercial purposes.  Any other use, in particular any reproduction, communication to the public or distribution of the content of this website, in whole or in part, for any other purpose and/or by any other means, without a specific licence agreement signed with AFP, is strictly prohibited.  The subject matter depicted or included via links within the Fact Checking content is provided to the extent necessary for correct understanding of the verification of the information concerned.  AFP has not obtained any rights from the authors or copyright owners of this third party content and shall incur no liability in this regard.  AFP and its logo are registered trademarks.
The Philippines’ social security agency said this report about a COVID-19 benefit payment was 'fake news' | AFP Fact Check