At a glance:

• More reports of sexual harassment surface on social media than what schools investigate. 
• Two girls dared to file complaints, but felt their school administrators would side with their abusers. 
• School administrators appeal to students to file complaints so they can investigate, but the law says they can initiate probes on their own.

Trigger warning: This story contains descriptions of sexual harassment and predatory behavior.

READ Part 1: This is how my teacher groomed me

In 2020, a number of girls came forward on social media with stories of being harassed by their teachers, even posting screenshots of the perpetrators’ messages. 

Using the hashtag #DoBetter, plus the names of the institutions, these students, alumni, and their supporters told schools they had fallen short of protecting the young people in their care. Among those mentioned in the posts were St. Theresa’s College-Quezon City (STCQC), Miriam College, St. Paul College Pasig, Ateneo de Manila University, School of the Holy Spirit of Quezon City, Marikina Science High School, and Bulacan State University.

In response, schools posted official statements on the issue, usually saying they heard the concerns and didn’t tolerate sexual abuse, and encouraged students to report their concerns through official channels.

Not much is known, however, about how individual schools handle cases of sexual harassment. Of the names dropped on social media, how many teachers are dealt with administratively, if at all? How many continue teaching and preying on more students? How are the victims taken care of?

We go back to the stories of Meulin*, Crystal*, and Jastine Yap, whose high school teachers groomed them for exploitation. Their experiences with how STCQC handled their complaints can be instructive. If anything, they show some small wins, but a battle that was far from easy.

The STCQC administration declined an interview with Rappler about these specific cases, as well as other reports circulating on social media. Instead, they outlined their efforts to curb sexual harassment in school.

Jastine of STCQC: Asked to apologize to her abuser

The “relationship” that Mr. Morales* had with Jastine and Meulin from his Grade 11 philosophy class changed when the girls learned that he had also been communicating in flirtatious ways with other students. 

Jastine told Morales that she wouldn’t rat on him if he promised to stop talking to all the other girls. Meulin, meanwhile, threatened to cut ties with him. But Morales emotionally blackmailed Jastine, threatening suicide. “I’m walking along Maginhawa [Street] now and I hope I get hit by a car,” he told Jastine in a text message. She caved. 

The STCQC administration eventually found out about what was going on between teacher and students when screenshots of their exchanges spread. Jastine and Meulin spoke to school officials initially without their parents’ knowledge. 

But rather than focusing on the teacher’s alleged predatory behavior, as indicated in the exchanges, STCQC seemed more interested in finding out who circulated the screenshots and how scandalous the students’ behavior had been, Jastine said. Administrators even asked Jastine to write an apology letter to Mr. Morales.

The school gave Jastine a failing grade for behavior for allegedly “lying” in the school’s investigation into the screenshot incident. Jastine said she wasn’t given the chance to confirm or deny the “relationship” because the administrators took the teacher’s word denying that there was something between them. She told them she didn’t understand how she got involved in the “scandal” and why she was the one being bullied by her peers.

Eventually, Jastine opened up to her mother Christine Yap. But it was already October 2016, the end of the first semester – “already late in the game,” as Christine described it. 

The teacher had resigned, but Christine was determined to go after him.

Jastine’s parents appealed the failing grade. But in a letter dated March 8, 2017, a copy of which was provided by the family to Rappler, STCQC directress Josefina Nebres upheld the grade and insisted due process was followed.

Excerpt of letter provided by Jastine Yap

Jastine’s family elevated the case to the Department of Education (DepEd), alleging Jastine was deprived of child protection and that Morales was favored. After two years, the DepEd ruled in the Yaps’ favor.

The Yap family provided Rappler a copy of DepEd’s February 2019 resolution, which ruled that STCQC:

• Failed to protect Jastine from bullying
• Held an investigation that was “tainted with irregularities and procedural defects”
• Failed to provide Jastine psychosocial intervention
• Failed to forward all records of the case to DepEd

“As alleged by Jastine, she was influenced by Mr. [Morales] to lie [about] their relationship. And there was nothing on the records which would show that said allegation was denied by Mr. [Morales]. As said, one cannot expect a minor to make the right decision especially when prodded by a teacher who has moral ascendancy over her person,” the DepEd decision read.

The DepEd voided Jastine’s failing grade, although STCQC claimed in a motion for reconsideration that DepEd didn’t have such power. The administration changed her grade anyway after making her do community service.

The Yap family still thinks the penalty on STCQC was a “slap on the wrist,” as they were told to simply revisit their anti-bullying policies.

“It was like no one was held accountable. The paper was just paper. I don’t feel like we won,” Christine said in Filipino.

Crystal of STCQC: Teacher terminated, but no apologies

Nine years after the abuse by her teacher in high school, Crystal gathered the courage to come forward. 

Mr. Duico*, her abuser, was still teaching at STCQC.

After #STCDOBETTER trended on Twitter, Nebres released a statement on June 26, 2020, saying the administration wasn’t “turning a blind eye” to the grievances aired online, and that it shared in the “sadness, pain, and hurts” of their students and alumni.

Students and alumni criticized the statement because it failed to properly apologize to the students. On the same day, the Theresian Student Council said the administration asked student leaders to “initiate dialogue” about the reports.

On July 3, 2020, Crystal filed an administrative complaint against Duico with STCQC. On July 9, STCQC announced the creation of its Student Care Council (SCC) – composed of administration, faculty, parents, lawyers, alumnae, and student representatives – which would process cases. Crystal’s was “Case #1.”

On August 5, STCQC terminated Duico for violating the anti-sexual harassment law, the teachers’ code of ethics, and the school’s policy against engaging in sex out of wedlock.

According to the decision, a copy of which Crystal provided Rappler, Duico didn’t address any of the allegations and only mentioned that he had been “subjected to public ridicule.”

To inform Crystal of the termination, STCQC emailed her a copy of the decision addressed to Duico. The school also wrote to her: “We commend you for your bravery and courage, and for shining a light to your trauma so that it does not happen again to another Theresian. Justice has been served today. We only wish you the very best in the days and years to come.” 

Crystal told Rappler via Facebook Messenger: “But it was super dragging. I kept on following up through emails and they took so long to provide details about the investigation. I formally asked for an apology from the school and the teacher, but I did not receive any.” 

STCQC declined an interview with Rappler, but reiterated the creation of its SCC, which it said was “fully compliant” with the Safe Spaces Act (SSA). The administration also mentioned that it held a 5-day webinar for the “whole STC community” on the SSA, gender sensitivity, sexual harassment, and bullying.

The administration said these webinars “provided enough guidance and direction for the next steps undertaken by the STCQC administration to ensure a safe learning environment for all our students, and personnel as well.”

But if you asked the victims who came forward, they pursued their complaints while in constant fear that the schools would side with their abusers. Aside from this, the school didn’t announce the creation of the SCC until after Crystal filed her case, despite a 1995 law already mandating all schools to have an anti-sexual harassment council.

The SCC has since received and processed at least five cases of sexual harassment, where all respondents are male teachers. Three of the cases – including Crystal’s – have been resolved in favor of the complainants, as of February 28, 2021. Anonymous complaints have been submitted, according to the SCC website, and the administration is working with the alumni support group TASHA (Theresians Against Sexual Harassment and Abuse) in gathering more details to be able to pursue these.

How Miriam College handled cases

Miriam College (MC) president Laura Quiambao del Rosario was willing to talk about their school’s experience with sexual harassment allegations. They, too, trended on Twitter with the #MCHSDOBETTER hashtag.

Out of around 3,000 relevant tweets, the administration identified 30 possible cases to pursue. Eleven filed formal complaints, some of which were not sexual harassment but verbal harassment by teachers, like shaming during class. Only one teacher mentioned in the social media reports was terminated.

Another case, Del Rosario said, was so serious that the school wanted to refer it to an external law firm. The teacher involved was found to be engaging in “verbal innuendos and casual touching of the body.”

However, none of the five to six girls he victimized wanted to pursue a case. 

“Rather than the perpetrator being afraid of the consequences of his action, the opposite happens. It’s the victim who becomes scared of the consequences she might experience if she speaks up,” De Dios added. 

The teacher Del Rosario referred to had already resigned in 2019, before the allegations surfaced on social media, and MC was unable to trace him. If the teacher would try to seek clearance when applying for a new job, Del Rosario said they would not provide it, and inform his prospective employer of his case.

Schools must not wait for formal complaints

Del Rosario highlighted the importance of the need for formal complaints, and the involvement of parents. One common reason students did not want to come forward was because they did not want their parents to know. The cases would stop there, even if administrators badly wanted them to push through.

But, according to the Safe Spaces Act, one of the duties of schools is to investigate sexual harassment cases even if there are no formal complaints filed – for as long as they have reasonable knowledge of possible abuse.

Do Twitter call-outs count as reasonable knowledge? Sentro ng Alternatibong Lingap Panligal (SALIGAN) lawyer Juan Carlo Tejano says it depends on each case. 

“The standard under the Safe Spaces Act is whether the school authorities have actual knowledge or reasonably should have known of the incident of sexual harassment,” he said.

At the same time, “schools should not make it difficult for victim-survivors to file complaints,” said Tejano. 

Schools can take steps to check on them, provide them with support and a gender-sensitive environment to tell their stories, and assist the survivor in drafting a complaint.

Fixing a flawed system

The passage of the Safe Spaces Act, while providing more support mechanisms for survivors than its forerunner law from 1995, is nothing without proper implementation, Tejano said.

De Dios said policies in line with the laws must be articulated “at the highest level” of every school. There must also be continuous training and education on gender issues for students, teachers, administrators, and non-teaching personnel, and mechanisms to monitor the policies’ implementation, like gender audits.

As for the predators that are able to teach in new schools, De Dios recommended a large-scale referral system where schools can flag that a teacher has a record of sexual harassment. DepEd and the Commission on Higher Education could take charge.

The concept is similar to the United States’ Sex Offender Registry. Nationwide, the Philippines does not have one yet.

Parents: First line of defense

When a teacher resigns before a case is closed, is it a dead end? Definitely not. The families can take the abusers to court.

This can be done with the help of anti-sexual harassment desks in barangays and in city and municipal halls. The Philippine National Police also has women and children’s desks in local stations.

Jastine’s mom Christine also emphasized the need for parents to be open with their children. Looking back, she felt guilty that she wasn’t aware of everything. She thought, maybe Jastine grew close to her teacher because he appreciated her.

“I won’t let this pass. I know all parents would do this for their children. Maybe parents need more strength to speak out. I may not be always available physically, but…I find time. If I can’t find time, I make time.” – with reports from Leika Golez/Rappler.com

*Names have been changed.

Senator Imee Marcos just did the unthinkable – criticize the “one horrific year” of a badly managed coronavirus pandemic under the government of her close ally President Rodrigo Duterte. 

Marcos was visibly frustrated in her Zoom call with Senate reporters on Monday, March 22, saying the country was “back to square one” since the Duterte administration’s imposition of one of the strictest lockdowns in the world did nothing to stop COVID-19 cases from surging again.

She zeroed in on the enforcement of stricter quarantine measures in the so-called “bubble” of COVID-19 hotspots: Metro Manila, Bulacan, Rizal, Laguna, and Cavite.

“Bakit naman dinadaan sa pagpalit ng pangalan? Para lang masabi na hindi tayo balik sa dati – from one horrific year after horrible year na nakapreso tayo sa bahay, na walang kinikita, at lahat ninerbyos nang todo-todo?” asked Marcos.

(Why go through these semantics? Just so they can deny that we’re back from where we started – from one horrific year after horrible year when we are imprisoned in our own homes, with no income, and always filled with anxiety?)

“After one awful year, we’re back to square one, arguably worse with almost 8,000 a day getting infected,” she added. 

Marcos also publicized a copy of a draft Department of Health administrative order seeking to bar certain types of companies from procuring COVID-19 vaccines for their workers.

It’s personal for the senator, since the the proposed ban would include the tobacco industry – the lifeblood of her bailiwick Ilocos Norte.

Marcos even went as far as urging Duterte to abolish the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases.

It’s hard to imagine Marcos throwing scathing remarks at the national government, given her record of giving unwavering support to Duterte.

Duterte himself had said in 2016 that he was beholden to Marcos for helping him win the presidential race. That same year, the President gave his go signal to give a hero’s burial to Imee’s father, dictator Ferdinand Marcos.

Fast forward to five years later and it seems Marcos is now more willing to throw jabs at Duterte – or his government at least. 

Things may be different now, after all, after the President’s grip on the Supreme Court proved to be not enough to convince the magistrates to allow Imee’s younger brother Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr to sit as vice president.

So is this a case of Imee the senator calling out the failures of Duterte’s pandemic response, or the story of a bitter ally who didn’t get what she – or what her family – wanted from the President? – Rappler.com

At a glance:

• Claim: A mandatory seminar is now required for driver’s license renewal.
• Rating: FALSE
• The facts: The Department of Transportation (DOTr) said the Land Transportation Office (LTO) has no such issuance or directive, only a proposal for possible discussion and consultation.
• Why we fact-checked this: Posts containing this claim were spotted through social media monitoring tool CrowdTangle.

Complete details:

A Facebook post by the Mindanao Daily Mirror states that the LTO in the Davao Region announced a mandatory seminar for drivers who will renew their licenses valid for up to 10 years.

It quoted LTO Davao Region spokesperson Loida Igdanes as saying that a 4-hour reorientation course is needed for non-professional driver’s license holders, while an 8-hour reorientation course is required for professional driver’s license holders.

The attached graphic was reposted by other Facebook pages. These posts were spotted through social media monitoring tool CrowdTangle.

This claim is false.

On Thursday, March 18, Transportation Assistant Secretary Goddes Libiran addressed the claim by posting the graphic with added text, saying, “LTO does not have an issuance or directive like this.”

“Mayroon pa lamang pong proposal for possible discussion and consultation,” she said. (There is only a proposal for possible discussion and consultation.)

The LTO is an agency under the DOTr.

The Mindanao Daily Mirror and the Philippine Information Agency published almost identical articles on this supposed mandatory seminar. The articles reported Igdanes as saying that the LTO in the Davao Region is “only waiting for the finalization of guidelines from the LTO national office.”

The articles also read, “She clarified that in the absence of the guideline, there is no four to eight-hour seminar requirement yet.”

Republic Act No. 10930, which was cited by Igdanes in the report, does not stipulate seminar requirements, specifying only that “the LTO shall promulgate prerequisites and guidelines before the grant of drivers’ licenses” and that “the conduct of theoretical and practical examinations, among others, must sufficiently measure the competency of drivers.”

In addition, according to the LTO website, the only two requirements for holders of both professional and non-professional licenses is the presentation of the original license and a medical certificate, provided that the license has not been expired for more than two years. – Loreben Tuquero, Therese Litonjua/Rappler.com

Therese Litonjua is a Rappler intern. This fact check was reviewed by a member of Rappler’s research team and a senior editor. Learn more about Rappler’s internship program here.

Keep us aware of suspicious Facebook pages, groups, accounts, websites, articles, or photos in your network by contacting us at factcheck@rappler.com. Let us battle disinformation one Fact Check at a time.

At a glance:

• Claim: President Rodrigo Duterte has declared a revolutionary government. 
• Rating: FALSE
• The facts: The videos contain selected excerpts from a 2017 interview where the President said he would declare a revolutionary government if there was destabilization. Duterte and Malacañang have repeatedly denied having any interest or plan in declaring a revolutionary government. 
• Why we fact-checked this: The Youtube videos with these claims have a combined 479,884 views.

Complete details:

At least 9 videos from various Youtube channels have been uploaded since March 12 with titles claiming that President Rodrigo Duterte has declared a revolutionary government or RevGov. 

One of the videos – titled “SPICY NEWS: PRES DUTERTE DECLARES REV GOV! LENI [Robredo] AT DILAWAN NATAKOT NA!” (Spicy news: President Duterte declares RevGov! Leni [Robredo] and the Yellows are afraid!) – includes an excerpt of the President saying: “Mag-declare ako ng (I will declare a) revolutionary government, period. And I will declare – I will clear the streets and I will declare all government positions vacant.”

The videos contain cherry-picked excerpts of the President mentioning a revolutionary government. The videos feature soundbites and selected clips, many from a 2017 interview of Duterte with broadcaster Erwin Tulfo, with titles claiming that a RevGov is confirmed, declared, or underway.

As of writing, the Youtube videos with these claims have a combined 479,884 views.

These claims are false. 

Duterte’s statements came from an October 2017 interview with Tulfo, wherein the President was asked whether or not he was concerned about destabilization. Since that interview, the President and Malacañang have repeatedly denied that they have plans to call for a revolutionary government. 

In the interview, Duterte said that RevGov would be possible in the face of destablization, but did not declare it. He said: “’Pag ang destabilization ninyo patagilid na at medyo magulo na, I will not hesitate to declare a revolutionary government until the end of my term.” (When your destabilization starts causing chaos, I will not hesitate to declare a revolutionary government until the end of my term.)

In November 2017, the President told the military that he would not declare a revolutionary government. He told soldiers, “Ang sabi nila, revolutionary [government], coup d’etat. Huwag ’nyo intindihin ’yan, malayo ’yan.” (They say there will be a revolutionary [government], a coup d’etat. Don’t concern yourselves with that, that’s far from happening).

Also in November 2017, the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the Department of National Defense said that they would not be supporting any moves to establish a revolutionary government.

In August 2020, the President once again denied any plans for a RevGov. He said in a speech filmed in Davao City: “May naglalabas, revolutionary government, tapos ako ang sinasabi na – wala akong pakialam niyan, wala akong kilala na mga tao na ’yan at hindi ko ’yan trabaho,” said Duterte, speaking from Davao City.

(There are calls for a revolutionary government, and they’re saying I am – I’m not involved in that, I don’t know those people, and I don’t work that way.)

In a press briefing on March 16, Tuesday, Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said that the President does not need a revolutionary government, adding that elections will be held as scheduled in 2022. – Therese Litonjua/Rappler.com

Therese Litonjua is a Rappler intern. This fact check has been reviewed by a member of Rappler’s research team and a senior editor. Learn more about Rappler’s internship program here.

Keep us aware of suspicious Facebook pages, groups, accounts, websites, articles, or photos in your network by contacting us at factcheck@rappler.com. Let us battle disinformation one fact check at a time.

After the “Bloody Sunday” operations that saw the death of 9 activists and the arrest of 6 others, another person from an indigenous peoples’ group was nabbed for questionable reasons. 

It was 5:30 in the morning of March 21, 2021, in Barangay Lapasan, Cagayan De Oro. Renalyn Tejero, a 25-year-old Surigao-based activist, was arrested by the police – over charges that she was unaware of. 

According to rights group Karapatan, Tejero was brought to a facility no one knew about except the police and stayed there until midday of March 21. Eventually, the group found her at the headquarters of PNP Caraga at Camp Colonel Rafael Rodriguez in Butuan City.

She was accused of murder and multiple attempted murder cases.

From Lumad student to rights worker

Tejero is a Lumad-Manobo and was a student of the Alternative Learning Center for Agricultural and Livelihood Development, Inc. (Alcadev), a place designed to provide secondary education to children from the Manobo, Higaonon, Banwaon, Talaandig, and Mamanwa tribes.

Upon graduating from Alcadev, she passed the Department of Education placement exam and pursued higher education. As a full scholarship recipient of Enfants du Mekong Foundation, a French charity that sponsors the education of disadvantaged children, she finished an undergraduate degree in Sociology at Caraga State University. 

While at the university, she served as the chairwoman of Student Christian Movement of the Philippines (SCMP) and was elected as a senator of the university student council. 

After her graduation, she devoted herself to humanitarian work as she became a paralegal officer of Karapatan in the Caraga region. 

She also served as the spokesperson of the SCMP and the Promotion of Church People’s Response in her region. 

As a paralegal officer, Tejeros devoted her time upholding the rights of the people. According to Assert Socio-Economic Initiatives Network (Ascent), a non-governmental organization, Tejeros tirelessly assisted two of their members when they were detained in Butuan City jail for trumped-up charges. 

Red-tagged, threatened

In November 2020, she was red-tagged in a tarpaulin by a group named “Movement against Terrorism,” along with 32 other individuals from various progressive organizations in the Caraga region.

The same tarpaulin included Bayan Muna Representative Eufemia Cullamat, and another Karapatan worker, Naty Campos-Castro.

In a statement, Karapatan said the arrest of Tejero was meant to silence her.  

“Renalyn Tejero is a young, brave, and dedicated human rights worker — and for her work, she has faced various threats and red-tagging. She is not a criminal nor a terrorist, and there is no question that these charges against her are fabricated and are only obviously meant to threaten her, to silence her from continuing her human rights work,” Karapatan Secretary General Cristina Palabay said.

Palabay also reiterated that human rights work is not equivalent to terrorism. 

“Defending people’s rights is neither a crime [nor] an act of terrorism — and these lies against us will not stop us from our work in the face of a regime that brazenly disregards and violates human rights,” she said. – Rappler.com

Despite his lack of resources, Rhondon Aligarbes made sure his 4 children would not miss this school year, even if it meant burning the candle at both ends just to support their remote learning needs.

The 41-year-old construction worker told Rappler in a phone interview on Thursday, March 18, that the pandemic was not a hindrance to his children’s ability to continue their education. But just like many parents bearing the brunt of the distance learning setup, Aligarbes believes that the government’s lack of support for struggling families like his is what’s making things more difficult.

Aligarbes is the only one providing for his family; his wife, who used to work as a canteen helper before the pandemic, had lost her job. Two of their children are college students in a state university, one is in the 8th grade at a public school, and one is in kindergarten.

Despite the burdens of distance education, particularly on his finances, Aligarbes said that he would still not let his children attend school physically should the government allow face-to-face classes. Aligarbes and his family reside in a municipality in Laguna adjacent to virus epicenter Metro Manila. The province of Laguna has been reporting hundreds of COVID-19 cases in the past days. 

“I am protecting them from the virus. The fear of contracting it is still there,” he said.

On March 15, 2020, schools in the country were physically closed due to the pandemic, and have since been using a distance learning system – a mix of online classes, printed modules, and TV/radio lessons – following President Rodrigo Duterte’s directive to suspend in-person classes until a COVID-19 vaccine became widely available.  

Distance learning, however, has been criticized repeatedly. The country appears to be not fully prepared for it, as shown by teachers’ and students’ difficulty in coping with the new format, their lack of access to the necessary gadgets and an internet connection, and reports of erroneous learning modules.

Calls for face-to-face classes

On December 14, 2020, Duterte approved the dry-run of face-to-face classes for January 2021. However, he withdrew this when countries reported cases of the more infectious United Kingdom variant of COVID-19. 

Despite the lack of classrooms, basic health facilities, school nurses, and teachers, the Department of Education (DepEd) again made a pitch to resume in-person classes in the country on January 18.

In her pitch, Education Secretary Leonor Briones cited a survey her department conducted that supposedly showed that majority of students wanted face-to-face classes. Reporters have been asking the DepEd for a copy of the survey, but it has yet to release the copy as of posting time.

But Duterte on February 22 again rejected the DepEd’s bid as the UK COVID-19 variant reached the Philippines, with 223 cases as of March 20.

Aside from the DepEd, senators and groups have also been pushing for a pilot test of face-to-face classes at a small number of schools to prepare the system and address gaps before all schools in the country reopen.

Senator Sherwin Gatchalian, chairman of the Senate basic education committee, said that pilot testing of limited face-to-face classes would help experts to study how to mitigate the effects of the pandemic.

In November 2020, some senators and groups had already urged the DepEd to consider resuming face-to-face classes, as they expressed apprehension about whether students are able to retain much from the current modes of remote learning, especially those unable to take online classes. (READ: In remote learning, some students pay someone else to do their classwork)

‘Slow’ pandemic response

A year into the pandemic, the situation in the Philippines has worsened. The country experienced a record-breaking surge in COVID-19 infections on March 22, with 8,019 new cases reported – the highest since the pandemic began.

The country has over 677,653 COVID-19 infections as of March 23 while nearly 13,000 people have died. 

Since December 2020, Briones has been saying the Philippines is the only country in Southeast Asia whose schools remain closed. Indonesia, the only Southeast Asian nation which has more COVID-19 infections than the Philippines, however, still keeps its schools closed, although its capital Jakarta had moved to “gradually” reopen them in January 2021 before the new surge of infections.

Other Asian countries like Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam reopened schools again last year, but new outbreaks of COVID-19 prompted them to go back to the remote education system.

Aligarbes attributed the prolonged closure of schools to the government’s slow pandemic response. While he believes that there is no better alternative to face-to-face classes, he would rather not risk the lives of his children.

Though he admitted he has little knowledge about the country’s vaccination program, Aligarbes said that the slow pace of the inoculation drive is also a big factor why the Philippines is being left behind by other countries in the fight against COVID-19.

“The situation is slow. The response is too slow as well – for example, the vaccination. How many more years will we be in this situation?” he asked.

On March 1, the country began to legally roll out COVID-19 vaccines, among the last do so in Southeast Asia. As of Monday, March 22, only 336,656 have been vaccinated in the country, nowhere near the government’s 70 million target by the end of the year.

Global assessments show that the Philippines lags behind other countries in pandemic response based on the number of cases, number of deaths, and testing capacity – ranking 79th among 98 nations surveyed.

‘Give autonomy, not blanket rule’

Regina Sibal, lead convenor of education advocacy group Aral Pilipinas, said that aside from the slow response, the government’s top-down approach in its policy making is also another barrier in the reopening of schools. She said that the government should not be implementing a “blanket rule” across the country.

“The policies being implemented is one-size-fits-all, which should not be the case…. The challenge really is that different areas have different contexts [and] situations,” she said.

“We do understand that Metro Manila schools are using online [learning], but if you go to other areas that are already marginalized in terms of resources – those in the isolated islands, those living in the mountains, they are the ones who don’t have access to online learning and don’t have enough School Education Funds for [the] printing of modules…. What are their means to continue education under [the] remote learning setup?” she asked.

Sibal added that the government’s policies on education during the pandemic needs recalibration to address the concerns of the most vulnerable sectors.

“The solutions for those living in coastal areas, for example, are different from those living in the mountains. At the same time, the solutions in urban settings are also different,” Sibal explained.

Sibal added that the government should provide local communities with guidelines on how to contextualize solutions for their specific situations.

DepEd’s plan

In a Senate hearing on March 3, Education Undersecretary Nepomuceno Malaluan said that students would be allowed to stay in schools for a maximum of half a day only, should the proposed face-to-face classes pilot implementation push through in areas deemed low-risk.

Based on his presentation, a maximum of 50 schools per region would be allowed to participate in the pilot run. In terms of the number of classes,  only one class per grade level can hold face-to-face classes in a small school; a maximum of 3 classes per grade level in a medium school, and up to 5 classes per grade in a large school. Each class would have a maximum of 20 students, depending on the size of a classroom.

If the government decides to resume in-person classes in the middle of the pandemic, the lack of classrooms, nurses, and basic health facilities in the country’s public schools remains a concern. Rappler found that 2,970 schools in the country don’t have basic handwashing facilities, while only 28% of the 47,013 or 13,081 schools have a clinic.

In a Viber message to Rappler, Education Undersecretary Diosdado San Antonio said that they have presented their proposal to the President several times.

“He will make the final decision considering the health situation of the country and the requirements needed for the undertaking,” he said.

Meanwhile, James Francis Miradora of Aral Pilipinas said that the government should also be considering the capacity of the schools, households, and the local communities where the pilot implementation would be conducted, and not just the number of COVID-19 cases.

“At the very least, schools that would reopen [should] have access to basic handwashing facilities. But we are aware that those who don’t have access to them are also those that belong to lower-income municipalities. When we speak of reopening of schools, it should be a shared responsibility,” he said.

Another year of remote learning?

San Antonio said that DepEd is “preparing for all the possibilities and learning modalities next school year (whether through limited in-person classes or distance learning).”

“Learning modalities will greatly depend on the advice of the IATF in consideration of the national and local health situation. The health, safety, and well-being of our learners and teachers will remain to be on top of our priorities,” he added.

Alliance of Concerned Teacher Secretary General Raymond Basilio said that the government should allot enough budget for the education sector should the distance learning system be implemented again in the next school year.

“We are losing a generation of learners with this setup – unprepared, ill-budgeted. If we would still implement distance learning for one more year with not enough budget, no recourse, and no comprehensive plan, I think we’re facing a future of uncertainty,” he said.

In the 2021 budget, only P15 billion was approved for the distance learning setup – P35 billion short of the agency’s proposal. Briones earlier said that students should eventually “reduce dependence” on modular learning because of its cost. (READ: IN NUMBERS: School opening during a pandemic)

Teachers from public schools took it upon themselves to launch donation drives to raise funds for bond paper and printers. (READ: Help! These schools need bond paper, printers for students’ learning modules)

Meanwhile, Aral Pilipinas’ co-convenor Kat Tolosa raised the alarm over the learning crisis during the pandemic. “We cannot afford another year of remote learning. Even prior to the pandemic, we have a lot of catching up to do.”

Citing data from the World Bank, Tolosa said that the Philippines’ learning-adjusted years of school (LAYS) would be pushed back from 7.5 years pre-pandemic to 5.9 to 6.5 years, depending on the length of further school closures and the effectiveness of the remote learning setup.

This means that while the Philippine basic education system offers 12 years of instruction, Filipino students show proficiency equivalent to only around 6 years spent in school.

“It has been pushed back to 5.9 to 6.5 years due to learning losses. We already have learning losses. If we still continue with one more year of distance learning, it would go down further,” she said.

Tolosa asked: If the government could find ways to reopen the economy, why couldn’t it find ways to safely reopen schools while mitigating risks?

“There’s no end date in the pandemic. I’m not saying we open it now. In fact, we’re looking at August if this is a more reasonable timeframe. Let’s sync it with the new school year. But we have to start planning it now and laying it down concretely how,” she explained.

“Local governments should be involved in the planning stage,” she added.

But for Aligarbes, he would allow his children to attend face-to-face classes only if there are no more cases of COVID-19 being reported, and if they get vaccinated.

Advocates have been pushing for the government to make education accessible even in times of crises, as it is a constitutional right of every Filipino. Will DepEd and Malacañang listen to stakeholders this time? –Rappler.com

Editor’s note: All Filipino quotes were translated into English.

At a glance:

• Claim: Former president Ferdinand Marcos was a leader of a guerrilla group called “Maharlika” during World War II.
• Rating: FALSE
• The Facts: Various archival documents, the US Army, and the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP) have disproven the claims of Marcos being a guerrilla leader. According to these sources, the guerrilla unit was never recognized by the US government, and Marcos’ leadership of the supposed unit is questionable.
• Why we fact-checked this: The Facebook post with this claim has 350 reactions, 31 comments, and 184 shares as of writing. The page that shared it, “Filipino Future,” has been fact checked multiple times.

Complete details:

On March 19, Facebook page “Filipino Future” said that former president Ferdinand Marcos led a guerrilla group called “Maharlika” during World War II.

It said, “Mismong mga taong miyembro ng Guerilla Group ni Marcos noong World War 2 ang nagpapatunay na totoong may guerilla group si Marcos na tinawag niyang Mahárlika at hindi imbentong kwento ito.” (The members of Marcos’ guerrilla group during World War II proves that Marcos really had a guerrilla group called “Maharlika” and this isn’t a made-up story.)

The claim further asserts that the media and the Liberal Party were duped by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) because they want to steal the Marcos family’s supposed gold.

As of writing, the post has 350 reactions, 31 comments, and 184 shares. The page “Filipino Future” has been fact checked multiple times.

This claim is false. 

Various archival documents, army officers, the US Army, and the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP) have all disproven the claim that Marcos was a guerrilla leader during World War II. According to these sources, the guerrilla unit was never recognized by the US government, and Marcos’ leadership of the supposed unit is questionable.

According to a New York Times archived article dated January 23, 1986, “Between 1945 and 1948 various Army officers rejected Mr. Marcos’s two requests for official recognition of the [guerrilla] unit, calling his claims distorted, exaggerated, fraudulent, contradictory, and absurd.” American army investigators concluded that the unit did not exist. 

Ray C. Hunt Jr, a former army captain who directed guerrilla activities in Pangasinan, is quoted in the article as saying, “Marcos was never the leader of a large guerrilla organization, no way.”

The US army denied Marcos’ requests for the recognition of “Maharlika” on the basis that it had no definite organization and that “‘Maharlika’ had not actually been in the field fighting the Japanese and had not ‘contributed materially to the eventual defeat of the enemy,'” among other reasons. 

Further, the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP) published a 2016 study on Marcos’ wartime claims, among them his leadership of “Maharlika.” Using official primary sources and documents, the NHCP found that the unit was not recognized, and that Marcos’ guerrilla leadership was described as “questionable, non-existent, and even fraudulent.”

Previous claims about Marcos’ war medals were also debunked in the NHCP study.

Claims about the Marcos family’s supposed “million tons of gold” has also been proven false by Rappler before. The relevant fact checks are listed below:

• FALSE: Marcos family owns a ‘million tons of gold’
• FALSE: Philippines is country with highest gold reserves
• FALSE: George W. Bush says Philippines is wealthiest country in the world
• FALSE: Ferdinand Marcos’ Letter of Instruction for Bagong Lipunan currency
• FALSE: Filipino ‘royal family’ ruled over pre-colonial ‘Maharlika kingdom’

– Therese Litonjua/Rappler.com

Therese Litonjua is a Rappler intern. This fact check was reviewed by a member of Rappler’s research team and a senior editor. Learn more about Rappler’s internship program here.

Keep us aware of suspicious Facebook pages, groups, accounts, websites, articles, or photos in your network by contacting us at factcheck@rappler.com. Let us battle disinformation one fact check at a time.

More fact-checks on “Filipino Future”:

• FALSE: Ferdinand Marcos’ Letter of Instruction for Bagong Lipunan currency
• FALSE: Myanmar used Smartmatic machines in 2020 elections
• FALSE: Philippines is rich in water called deuterium
• FALSE: US federal gov’t watermarked ballots for 2020 election
• FALSE: PH economy got worse after Marcos was ousted
• FALSE: George W. Bush says Philippines is wealthiest country in the world

At a glance:

• Claim: Ormoc City Mayor Richard Gomez is in critical condition after figuring in a road crash in Kananga, Leyte.
• Rating: FALSE
• The facts: Gomez is alive and well, and he was not involved in a road crash. There are also no reports of the supposed incident from any legitimate news source.
• Why we fact-checked this: Facebook’s monitoring tool flagged 2 Facebook posts and 3 website links that contain this claim. The posts had over 500 combined shares on Facebook as of writing.

Complete details:

Two Facebook pages, “Trending 24/7” and “Metroviralpinas,” falsely claimed on Saturday, March 20, that Ormoc City Mayor Richard Gomez is in critical condition after a road crash in the municipality of Kananga in Leyte.

The captions of their posts linked to two websites, unanghiritstreamlive.xyz and dzbb594superradyo.xyz. These websites used the logo of GMA News and also referred to it as their source.

The web pages contained a video clip of what looked like a news report from 24 Oras, GMA Network’s evening news program. When clicked, the video showed newscasters Jiggy Manicad and Bernadette Sembrano for a few seconds then stopped to ask the reader to “uncover” the rest of the clip by providing their personal Facebook login details.

The claim about Gomez is false. The Ormoc City mayor is alive and well, as seen in the photos recently posted on his official Facebook account. There is also no report of the supposed incident from GMA News’ official channels.

On Monday, March 22, Gomez attended a virtual signing event with the Philippine Red Cross and a board meeting of local schools. He looked well in the photos from both events.

The websites unanghiritstreamlive.xyz and dzbb594superradyo.xyz are also not affiliated with GMA Network, its news arm GMA News, or its radio station Super Radyo DZBB. The official website of GMA News is gmanetwork.com/news, while its radio programs can be accessed at gmanetwork.com/radio/dzbb.

Gomez also refuted the claim on Saturday and called it “fake news.”

Claim Check, Facebook’s monitoring tool that identifies potentially dubious posts shared on the platform, flagged the posts from Facebook pages “Trending 24/7” and “Metroviralpinas” for verification. It also flagged gmaregionallive.xyz, another dubious link posing as GMA News, for spreading the same false claim.

The false Facebook posts had over 500 combined shares on Facebook as of writing. – Pauline Macaraeg/Rappler.com

Keep us aware of suspicious Facebook pages, groups, accounts, websites, articles, or photos in your network by contacting us at factcheck@rappler.com. Let us battle disinformation one Fact Check at a time.

Mahalagang malaman ang mga programa ng gobyerno, kasama ang mga tugon nito sa COVID-19 pandemic.

Kaya lang, may mga umano’y batas o polisiyang kumakalat kaugnay ng mga ito na hindi kapani-paniwala o kaya’y kulang sa konteksto.

Suriin at i-fact-check natin ang ilan sa mga sabi-sabing ito.

Una, may kumalat na sabi-sabi nitong Marso 2021 na mamimigay daw ng P10,000 na ayuda ang gobyerno para sa bawat Filipinong naapektuhan ng pandemya. ’Yung totoo?

• FALSE: Gov’t to give P10,000 pandemic aid to every Filipino

Pangalawa, may kumalat na graphic na nagsasabing kailangan na rin daw iparehistro ang mga bisikleta. Ano ’yung totoo?

• FALSE: Bicycle registration required starting February 2021

Pangatlo, may post na nagsabing lahat ng nagparehistro para sa emergency subsidy program gamit ang ReliefAgad app ay makatatanggap lamang ng kanilang pera sa pamamagitan ng GCash. Totoo ba ito?

• FALSE: All coronavirus cash aid to be coursed through GCash

Pang-apat, mayroong isang post na nagsabing makakatanggap daw ang senior citizens ng P6,000 na social pension mula sa DSWD bawat taon. Ang totoo, kulang ito sa konteksto.

• MISSING CONTEXT: Senior citizens entitled to P6,000 yearly from DSWD

At, panlima, may kumalat ding video na nagsasabing muling bubuksan ang Bataan Nuclear Power Plant. Ano ’yung totoo?

• FALSE: Bataan Nuclear Power Plant to reopen

Mga kaibigan, lima lamang ito sa mga nakalilinlang na post tungkol sa mga programa ng gobyerno. May nakita ka bang ibang post tungkol sa mga sabi-sabing katulad nito? Ipadala ang link at screenshot
sa factcheck@rappler.com! – Rappler.com

Bookmark this page to catch the discussion on Thursday 4 pm, March 25!

A year into the coronavirus pandemic, while many countries are seeing an improvement in their daily lives, the Philippines finds itself in a worse situation than before.

The daily number of new cases in the past week hit an all-time high, prompting the government to place the National Capital Region and nearby provinces in a “bubble.”

On Thursday, March 25, the Newsbreak team will discuss what’s happening in the Philippines, what’s lacking in government’s response, and what the pandemic’s overall impact on the country has been.

The discussion with Rappler editor at large Marites Vitug and multimedia reporters Sofia Tomacruz, Rambo Talabong, and Ralf Rivas will be moderated by Newsbreak Chats host and multimedia reporter Camille Elemia.

Join us on Thursday afternoon for the discussion. Let us know in the comments below or tag us on Twitter (@newsbreakph) if you have any questions! – Rappler.com

Watch other Newsbreak Chats episode in 2021:

• January 2021: Discovering Cebu
• February 2021: A closer look at Duterte’s drug war files, anti-communist budget

At a glance:

• Claim: COVID-19 vaccines are being used to identify and track people, and will biologically alter human forms. This makes them “barcodes for life.”
• Rating: FALSE
• The facts: COVID-19 vaccines do not work the way they were described in the video where the claim came from. They are not used to track or identify people.
• Why we fact-checked this: Several readers sent the video containing this claim to Rappler’s email and to the Facebook group “Fact-checking in the Philippines” for verification. As of writing, the video had over 222,000 views on Facebook, 14,100 shares, 6,800 reactions, and 1,900 comments.

Complete details:

Facebook page “The Keepers Of Chaim” uploaded a video on March 14 that falsely claimed COVID-19 vaccines are being used to tag people, essentially making them “barcodes for life.” The video also claimed that COVID-19 vaccines will eventually alter the biological form of humans.

The video, entitled “The Bar Code For Life,” featured an interview with a certain Celeste Solum. Solum was said to be a former officer of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the US agency responsible for assisting citizens during disasters.

Solum said COVID-19 vaccines are being used to alter the human body, with the primary goal of mass extermination.

“So what will happen with the vaccine is you get it injected into you, and then it self-assembles. And then it swarms through your body and it crosses your blood-brain barrier and it takes over your brain. It harvests your fluids in your body, your moisture, as it grows and it grows until we’re no longer human,” Solum said.

She then warned towards the end of the clip: “The only way to avoid it is to say no to the COVID test, to the vaccination.”

This is false. COVID-19 vaccines do not work the way Solum described. FEMA also denied that Solum was ever an employee of the agency.

Although Solum did not mention a specific vaccine brand, the video showed the logo of American pharmaceutical company Pfizer. Together with German biotechnology company BioNTech, Pfizer developed a vaccine for COVID-19 that introduces messenger RNA (mRNA) into the body.

Instead of the traditional way where the antigen is injected into the body, mRNA vaccines give the body the genetic code needed to produce the pathogen’s antigen itself. This spurs an immune response, which teaches the body how to defeat similar antigens in the future. They are not used to track or identify people.

There are also no indications that the COVID-19 mRNA vaccines can “take over” the human brain. According to Pfizer, potential side effects of its COVID-19 vaccine include injection site pain, fatigue, headache, muscle pain, chills, joint pain, fever, injection site swelling, injection site redness, nausea, malaise, and enlargement of the lymph nodes.

In June 2020, Reuters debunked a related claim from Solum that COVID-19 testing will “harvest” all the fluids in a person’s body. In its article, Reuters reported that a representative from FEMA said the agency “has no record of a Celeste Solum having ever been a FEMA employee.”

Several readers sent the video containing this claim to Rappler’s email and to the Facebook group “Fact-checking in the Philippines” for verification. As of writing, the video had over 222,000 views on Facebook, 14,100 shares, 6,800 reactions, and 1,900 comments.

Rappler previously fact-checked similar claims that COVID-19 nasal swabs can break the blood-brain barrier, that Moderna’s COVID-19 mRNA vaccine can alter human DNA, and that billionaire Bill Gates admitted the COVID-19 vaccine could permanently alter human DNA. These are all not true. – Pauline Macaraeg/Rappler.com

Keep us aware of suspicious Facebook pages, groups, accounts, websites, articles, or photos in your network by contacting us at factcheck@rappler.com. Let us battle disinformation one Fact Check at a time.

Subscribe to Newsbreak: Beyond the Stories podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, and Anchor.

Isang taon na ang coronavirus pandemic ngunit tila malayo pa ang tatahakin ng Pilipinas bago nito masabing natalo na nito ang virus.

Imbes na kakitaan ng malaking pagbabago – katulad ng maraming bansa –  lumalala pa lalo ang sitwasyon. Patuloy na dumarami ang bilang ng mga kaso sa Pilipinas, habang mabagal ang pag-rollout ng coronavirus vaccine.

Sa episode na ito, tatalakayin nina Rappler reporters Sofia Tomacruz, Bonz Magsambol, at researcher-writer Jodesz Gavilan kung bakit naging ganito ang sitwasyon sa Pilipinas.

Ayon kay Tomacruz, tila parang hindi pa natuto ang gobyerno sa nangyari nitong nakaraang taon:

What’s striking for me at this point is that it’s looking a lot like we haven’t learned from lessons that we should’ve already learned from last year. We had a whole year of trying to learn how to navigate the pandemic and respond, yet we’re in the same place we were last year. And I don’t even know kung same place siya or in some sense, a worse place, because there are so many things that we should’ve learned by now…. There are so many, so many suggestions and recommendations that health experts have made which we haven’t really tackled or listened to, I would say, because if we did listen to them genuinely, then maybe we would be in a better position than where we are in now.

Bakit biglang tumaas ang bilang ng may COVID-19 sa bansa? Saan nagkukulang ang gobyerno? Ayon kay Magsambol:

Ilang days na ba tayo naka-NCR+ bubble, pero parang wala pa akong naririnig na discussion sa kung paano patataasin ang testing capacity. How do we make sure na enough people ang na-te-test while naka-bubble tayo? Basically iyon ang sinasabi ng experts since then. Kung ilalockdown mo ang mga tao, dapat aggressive ang pag-contact tracing mo and at the same time, testing.

Ano ang posibleng worst case scenario? Pakinggan ang podcast.

Ang Newsbreak: Beyond the Stories ay podcast series ng Rappler tungkol sa mahahalaga at malalaking isyu sa Pilipinas. – Rappler.com

Pakinggan ang latest episodes ng Newsbreak: Beyond the Stories:

• ‘Nanlaban’: Ang paulit-ulit na salaysay ng mga pulis
• Mga artista at influencers na nagkakalat ng fake news, propaganda
• Ano ang maitutulong ng drug war report ng Department of Justice?
• Paano dapat itinuturo ang Martial Law at EDSA People Power Revolution sa kabataan?
• Bakit mapanganib ang bagong Coast Guard Law ng China?
• Bakit nagmahal ang mga bilihin ngayong pandemya?
• May patutunguhan ba ang muling pagsusulong sa charter change sa ilalim ni Duterte?
• Bakit delikadong wakasan ang 1989 UP-DND accord?
• Ano ang dapat malaman tungkol sa bagong COVID-19 variants?
• Gaano pa katagal maghihintay ang Pilipinas para sa coronavirus vaccine?

At a glance:

• Claim: The city of Manila implemented an ordinance in March 2021 providing for the temporary closure of all malls and similar establishments in the city.
• Rating: FALSE
• The facts: This was an old ordinance implemented in March 2020 and is no longer in effect.
• Why we fact-checked this: Posts containing this claim were spotted on social media monitoring tool CrowdTangle and on Facebook.

Complete details:

In March 2021, multiple Facebook users posted a graphic about the city of Manila’s Ordinance No. 8617, an ordinance that mandates the temporary closure of all malls and similar establishments in the city.

One user posted the graphic in an album, saying, “[Paalala] po… mga bagong ordinansa sa Maynila (Reminder, new ordinances in Manila).”

These posts were spotted on social media monitoring tool CrowdTangle and on Facebook.

This claim is false.

Manila Mayor Isko Moreno addressed this claim in a Facebook post on March 15, calling it “fake news.”

“The said city ordinance was posted last March 17, 2020 in line with the announcement that Metro Manila will be placed under the Enhanced Community Quarantine due to COVID-19 pandemic. We would also like to clarify that Ordinance No. 8617 is no longer in effect,” his post read.

The graphic used in the claim was posted on Facebook by the Manila Public Information Office on March 17, 2020.

Following the anniversary of the first pandemic-related lockdown announcement in the Philippines, social media users have been recirculating old graphics, putting them in a false or wrong context. (READ: Year after lockdown: How pandemic restrictions look like in PH)

Rappler earlier debunked separate claims saying Cavite province is preparing for a total lockdown while Tagaytay City is under lockdown as of March 18 or 19. – Loreben Tuquero/Rappler.com

Keep us aware of suspicious Facebook pages, groups, accounts, websites, articles, or photos in your network by contacting us at factcheck@rappler.com. Let us battle disinformation one Fact Check at a time.

While Manila celebrates its new archbishop, Catholics in Cebu might also find reason to hope.

The appointment of Cardinal Jose Advincula, 68-year-old archbishop of Capiz, as new Manila archbishop means Pope Francis might name another cardinal from the Philippines. Could it finally be Archbishop Jose Palma of Cebu?

To put this in proper perspective, a cardinal is not just any other bishop.

Cardinals serve as advisers to the Pope and, if below the age of 80, can elect the Pope’s successor. They hold the highest title in the Catholic Church, next to “pope.” And, in countries like the Philippines, where the Catholic Church holds much influence, a cardinal’s words can help topple governments.

There are now only 227 cardinals in the 1.2-billion-strong Catholic Church. Of this number, only 126 are cardinal electors, or cardinals eligible to join the next papal election. In the Philippines, where Christianity has been alive for 500 years, there have been only 9 Filipino cardinals in history.

Traditionally, the Philippines has only two cardinal electors based in the country at any given time. They’re usually the archbishops of Manila and Cebu – the likes of the politically influential Jaime Cardinal Sin and Ricardo Cardinal Vidal, both of whom helped oust dictator Ferdinand Marcos in 1986.

But in 2014, Francis already broke tradition by naming the first cardinal from Mindanao, then-Cotabato archbishop Orlando Quevedo. At that time, the Philippines’ two cardinal electors were Quevedo and then-Manila archbishop Luis Antonio Cardinal Tagle.

After Quevedo turned 80 in March 2019, and Tagle left for a Vatican post in February 2020, Filipinos were left without a cardinal elector based in the Philippines and heading a diocese. (Tagle is now like the late Cardinal José Sánchez, who was Filipino but was based in the Vatican during the time of Sin and Vidal.)

Then, in November 2020, Francis formally made Advincula a cardinal. This made church watchers think chances became dimmer for Palma, 71, to become a cardinal. After all, if there would be another cardinal based in the Philippines, historically and based on common practice, that would likely be the next archbishop of Manila, right?

Now, with Cardinal Advincula of Capiz becoming Manila archbishop, His Holiness “Lolo Kiko” has another red hat (a symbol of cardinals) to give to a bishop living in the Philippines. Many Filipino Catholics hope this would go to Cebu, the cradle of Christianity in the country.

Or, better yet – since India (where only 2% is Catholic) has 3 cardinal electors and the US (with Catholics comprising only a fifth) has 9 – would the Pope give more to the country that has the world’s 3rd highest number of Catholics? – Rappler.com

One year into the pandemic, the Philippines is facing its worst COVID-19 outbreak yet. Filipinos have seen the country breach its record number of new COVID-19 cases multiple times in the past two weeks, with the Department of Health (DOH) logging an all-time high of 8,773 new infections on Thursday, March 25.

Of this number, 4,895 infections are from the National Capital Region (NCR).

Data from the DOH indicate that barangays in or near commercial hubs in the region were among the areas most affected by this unprecedented spike in cases.

These came in the wake of government efforts in 2021 to further reopen the economy. Malacañang and the DOH have offered different explanations for the surge in infections.

Outbreaks in traditionally busy locations

From March 19 to 25, the barangay with the most number of new COVID-19 infections was Fort Bonifacio in Taguig. The village, with 343 fresh cases in the past week, is home to Bonifacio Global City.

The Taguig City government, however, clarified on Thursday that it only registered 116 new COVID-19 cases from March 18-24. It said that the number reported by the DOH included “positive cases that have already recovered, cases that turned out to be negative, presumptive positive cases, equivocal cases, inconclusive cases, and those awaiting results of the tests.”

Second in the list is Pasay city’s Barangay 76, where SM Mall of Asia, one of the largest malls in the Philippines, is located. The village logged 322 fresh cases in the past week.

Barangay 183, also in Pasay, ranked third with 245 new cases in the same period. The village is close to the airport, cluster of hotels, and commercial establishments that include Resorts World Manila, an integrated tourism hub.

Other barangays in the top 10 include:

• Pio Del Pilar, a commercial area in Makati
• Parañaque’s Don Bosco, which houses SM Bicutan
• Bel-air, Makati, which is near the Ayala Triangle Gardens
• Parañaque’s BF Homes, a known food hub for its wide array of restaurants and eateries.

Some of the barangays in the top 10 are among the most populous villages in their respective cities, a possible reason why they have a high number of COVID-19 cases. These barangays include:

• Barangay 183 in Pasay
• Pinagbuhatan in Pasig
• Commonwealth in Quezon City
• BF Homes in Parañaque
• Marulas, the second most populous village in Valenzuela

The table above also showed a comparison between fresh cases reported in the past week and the new cases reported from March 12 to 18. 

Number of cases per capita

A quick glance at the ranking of the 50 villages with the most number of new COVID-19 cases in the past seven days showed that Quezon City has the highest number of barangays in the list, with 12. Parañaque has 9, while Makati and Taguig each have 6.

But a ranking of villages with the highest number of fresh COVID-19 infections per capita in the same period offered an entirely different picture of the city governments’ COVID-19 fight. In the table below, per capita means the number of cases per 1,000 people.

Based on the data, Manila (31 barangays) and Pasay (15 barangays) account for 46 of the top 50 villages with COVID-19 cases. Caloocan has two barangays, while Valenzuela and Taguig each have one.

Topping this ranking is Pasay City’s Barangay 76, which, again, is home to the SM Mall of Asia. Data showed that thus far, around 17% of the village’s population contracted COVID-19 this March.

(Note: Rappler excluded Barangays 99 and 653 in Manila, as well as Barangay 76 in Caloocan when reviewing data, because of extremely low population counts here. The 2015 Census of Population by the Philippine Statistics Authority listed their population count to 20 residents or less.)

Numerous villages are back to square one

Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque had insisted that the Philippines is “not back to square one” on the first anniversary of the lockdowns in the country. But numbers don’t lie, and some villages are showing a significant increase in new coronavirus infections from February to the first 25 days of March.

Still looking at the top 50 villages in terms of new COVID-19 cases per capita in the past 7 days, areas like Manila’s Barangay 291, which had only one new case in February, had 33 fresh infections as of March 25. 

Pasay’s Barangay 154 also logged a notable spike in infections during the same period, from one new case in the month of February to 16 fresh infections in March.

What local governments are doing

For context, Pasay was the first city in Metro Manila to bear the brunt of the entry of the COVID-19 South African variant in the Philippines in early March. It has since placed multiple areas in the city under localized lockdowns.

The nation’s capital, Manila, has done the same. On March 17, the OCTA Research group said there is hope that localized lockdowns “will work to some extent, together with reduced mobility, curfews, stricter implementations, and city ordinances” to reduce the reproduction number in the NCR.

The reproduction number refers to the number of people one COVID-19 case can infect.

OCTA said on Thursday, March 25, that the reproduction number in Metro Manila is 1.91. It must be kept below 1 to slow the spread of infections.

The national government has placed Metro Manila and the provinces of Bulacan, Cavite, Laguna, and Rizal under a travel bubble setup called “NCR Plus” until April 4. OCTA on March 24 said the government may have to put in place stricter lockdown measures if the current bubble setup fails to curb COVID-19 transmissions after a couple of weeks.

Better adherence to protocols

Data from the Department of Labor and Employment showed that 17% of business establishments recorded occupational safety violations of COVID-19 protocols from January to February 2021.

DOLE said on March 23 that the most common violation is the failure of establishments to meet the agency’s guideline on including a COVID-19 control plan in their occupational safety and health programs.

The government faces a continuous challenge to keep business establishments in check, making sure that they comply with health safety standards, as the Duterte administration insists on keeping a delicate balance between keeping the economy open and prioritizing the health of Filipinos.

The public, especially those living near a commercial hub, also needs to heed the reminder of the DOH to observe minimum health standards, such as wearing masks and maintaining good hand hygiene.  – Rappler.com

Editor’s Note: While a microscopic virus is sweeping the world like the plagues of old, an invisible force – not less powerful – is also shaping the way this pandemic unfolds. For thousands of years, despite efforts to render it irrelevant or remove it from the modern world, religion has deeply influenced the way people think, behave, and ultimately make sense of sickness and death. We are witnessing this, sometimes undetected, during the COVID-19 pandemic, a health crisis that has killed more than 2.7 million people across the globe.

In Southeast Asia, the influence of religion during the pandemic is most pervasive in the Philippines and Indonesia. The Philippines, a country of 110 million people, has the biggest Catholic population in Asia and the 3rd largest worldwide. Indonesia, with more than 275 million people, is the country with the largest number of Muslims.

In this 3-part series, we bring you to deathbeds in Manila and graveyards in Jakarta, Sunday services in churches and Friday prayers in mosques, to show the role of religion in this pandemic that is often viewed only through scientific lens. Our journey begins where religion shows its power the most: the hour of death.

Wounded healer

Father Dan Cancino, 46, was on the verge of tears as he recalled one of his most painful experiences during the pandemic: his first time to bless a dying victim of COVID-19.

Cancino is a Catholic priest and doctor of public health belonging to the Camillian order, whose members take a vow to comfort the sick even at their own risk. He has tended to victims of COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic – but to do this for a dying friend, no less, was most heartbreaking.

The Camillians on Facebook

“Father, can you bless him?” his friend’s sister begged in a phone call in August 2020. “Can you bless him, even online? He wants to see you.”

So Cancino performed what was once unthinkable before the pandemic: anointing the sick via video-conferencing. In a Catholic ritual called anointing of the sick, a priest uses holy oil to trace a cross on the forehead of the dying, then says a prayer to forgive the person’s sins and offer his or her life to God. 

Cancino and his friend’s family set up a video call with the help of a nurse at his friend’s side, clad in full-body personal protective equipment (PPE). 

“It’s so difficult really seeing a friend dying without really being near, without really touching him,” said Cancino. “But you know, at that point, hearts were burning and our prayer was so intense.”

His friend was conscious, Cancino said. “He was aware because he was raising his hand,” the priest said, recounting how his friend, an active church worker, struggled but failed to make the sign of the cross. “And we just said, ‘No more.’”

By around 5 pm that day, his friend died – physically alone, but not abandoned.

“And I’m just hoping that he felt that he was not alone. Well, spiritually and theologically maybe as a priest, I can say that he’s not alone dying. The Lord is with him,” Cancino said. 

He also said the pandemic hit much closer to home when his mother and father, aged 95 and 89, respectively, also got COVID-19. “That was a difficult moment for me. I was not with them.”

“And they were telling us it’s not COVID-19 that will kill them, it’s the loneliness and the difficulty of being alone,” Cancino said. “And my mother was telling me, ‘Will I still go home? Will I still be alive when I get up from here?’ So it’s the mental health, human mentality, affected.”

Mental health ‘pandemic’

The COVID-19 pandemic, according to Cancino, can lead to what he calls another “pandemic”: a mental health crisis. 

Carlito Galvez, chief implementer of the government’s anti-COVID 19 task force, himself said quarantine-induced isolation has wrought “disastrous” psychological effects.

A study conducted during the pandemic’s early phase found that a quarter of Filipinos have experienced “moderate-to-severe anxiety,” while a sixth experienced “moderate-to-severe depression and psychological impact.” As the pandemic raged on in 2020, the Philippine Statistics Authority recorded a 25.7% rise in deaths due to suicide. 

To address this, the Philippine government asked religious leaders in August 2020 to help spread the “message of hope to our suffering countrymen…to stave off more incidents of self-destruction.”

Dominican priest and microbiologist Father Nicanor Austriaco believes that one’s religion and spirituality is valuable in making sense of all the suffering. 

“If you notice, the mental health issues associated with a pandemic are exacerbated in secular societies precisely because individuals do not have the kind of resources, the emotional, psychological, and theological resources to understand what is happening to them,” Austriaco said.

“I cannot tell a man whose grandfather is dying, you know, he will say to me, ‘What’s happening?’ and I go, ‘It’s a zoonotic transmission of a novel betacoronavirus with a case fatality rate of .3%.’ Useless. It’s true, it’s true, it’s true knowledge. But for someone who is suffering? Useless knowledge,” Austriaco said.

Churches help build resiliency among a suffering people, said Cancino, who is also executive secretary of the health care arm of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines. “In this uncertain time, there’s only one certainty – God. And that’s where we can find more consolation and hope.”

The Camillians/Facebook

He added, “If mental illness is real, if depression is real, so is hope and so is faith, right?”

Changing death rituals

In Indonesia, the pandemic has affected not only the process of grieving, but also the elaborate death rituals followed by Muslims around the world. 

Usually, according to Islamic law, a body is washed from toe to head with running water, according to Dr Makky Zamzami, head of the Nahlatul Ulama COVID-19 Task Force. Then the body is wrapped in a shroud. The body is then prayed to at the mosque or at home before being taken to the funeral. 

But Makky initially felt that the process of handling the bodies of COVID-19 patients seemed excessive. At first, those who died, usually from the hospital, were immediately taken to the cemetery. The funeral workers wore level 3 PPEs, the highest level of PPEs, which made them look like astronauts. It was “like dealing with Ebola patients in Africa,” he said.

The attitude of Makky and many other people, however, eventually changed. 

Nurdiansah/Tempo

During the pandemic, a dead body is only smeared with water, as when a person performs ablution. After that, it is immediately dipped, put in a crate, and taken to the cemetery. At the cemetery, the face of the body is turned toward the Qibla, the direction of Mecca toward which Muslims face for prayers. But there’s no way the chest can be opened by the family, because opening it for viewing is potentially infectious.

Dr Corona Rintawan, chair of the Muhammadiyah COVID-19 Command Center, explained that handling corpses is a challenge in itself. One of the sources of objections by residents and family is that they do not believe that their families who died are handled according to Islamic law. The funeral carried out by health workers wearing level 3 PPE also raised concerns among members of the community because it increased the probability of transmission.

One of the things done by Dr Corona at the Muhammadiyah Hospital in Lamongan, East Java, was to assuage that fear. For example, before bathing, the body is decontaminated first. The bathing officer wears level 3 PPE. After the bath, they wrap the body in 6 layers of plastic, then put it in a coffin. 

“We are facilitating families to see the process, using level 3 PPE. So that they see that the process is in accordance with sharia (Islamic law). So that there is relief for the family because they can attend,” he said.

By wrapping the body in 6 layers of plastic, said Dr Corona, there is little chance of infection. With such conditions, funeral officials do not need to wear level 3 PPE, they just need to wear a mask at the funeral. 

“So that the community’s rejection of the funeral is reduced,” he said. There was an incident where the family was almost forced to handle the management of the family’s body by themselves. The hospital then coordinated with the regional COVID-19 Task Force and the police to convince the family.

The matter of victims’ funerals has become one of the strongest sources of discomfort among Muslims whose family or close friends have experienced a disaster. Anwar Abbas, deputy head of the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI), had a similar experience when his close colleague, Nadjamuddin Ramly, died of COVID-19 on February 21. Nadjamuddin is a former deputy secretary of MUI and deputy chairman of the Muhammadiyah Central Executive Council (PP).

In Indonesia, when a close friend or family member dies, there is a strong desire to come to pay last respects by participating in prayer for him or carrying his coffin to the funeral. It’s a ritual that can’t be done during a pandemic. 

When he heard that Nadjamuddin died at the Muhamadiyah Hospital in Bandung, Abbas said he was confused. “There was a strong desire to come, also not to come because of the pandemic situation.”

To honor his colleague, Abbas finally performed prayers from his home. He knew that the scholars had different opinions about this. But he decided to keep praying on his own to honor his close friend. “This COVID-19 has disrupted not only the economy, but our social life,” said Abbas.

“With the extent of the impact of this pandemic, it is impossible for COVID-19 to be tackled only by the government. All components of society must take a role. Likewise with religious leaders,” said KH Robikin Emhas, a religious figure and head of the executive board of Nahdlatul Ulama. Since Indonesia is a Muslim majority country, added Robikin, “the influence of religious figures is quite significant.”

Hery Trianto, public communication head of the COVID-19 task force, said religious leaders, who are among opinion leaders, have an important role in dealing with COVID-19, especially in persuading people to change their behaviors. 

Cancino, the doctor-priest, echoed the same role for faith leaders in the Philippines.

“Religious-inspired institutions or organizations can promote helpful, proper information that can prevent stigma, fear, discrimination, among the people. That is very, very important, because faith communities are trusted communities,” Cancino said.

Despite their role in communities, however, religious leaders like Cancino aren’t immune to questions about their own faith. “Seeing a 5-year-old girl in the isolation room, I had questions. I had questions when I knew my parents had COVID-19. I had questions every time I’d arrive in the hospital and they’d say, ‘Father, we’re full packed.’” 

“But my next question is, what can we do?” Cancino said. “This is what’s happening, what can we do right now?” – with reports from Jezreel Ines/Rappler.com

(To be continued. Part 2 | Religion: The pandemic’s unseen force) 

This story, a collaboration between Rappler and Indonesia’s Tempo Magazine, was published with support from the Sasakawa Peace Foundation.

At a glance:

• Claim: Carlos P. Romulo represented the Philippines in the Bretton Woods Conference that took place in 1944. 
• Rating: FALSE
• The facts: Romulo was not among the representatives to the Bretton Woods Conference in 1944. The Philippine delegates were Andres Soriano, Jaime Hernandez, Joseph Foley, and Ismael Mathay. 
• Why we fact-checked this: As of writing, the video containing this post had been viewed 829,000 times, and the post has 39,000 reactions, 2,500 comments, and 31,000 shares.

Complete details:

Facebook page “Ophir” posted a video on March 15 that said Carlos P. Romulo was a Philippine representative to the Bretton Woods Conference held in New Hampshire in 1944. 

The video said: “Bakit ipapahiram ang mga ginto sa ibang bansa? Simple lang. Sa desisyong nabuo sa Bretton Woods Conference of 1944 na ginanap sa New Hampshire, USA, na dinaluhan ng 44 countries kasama ang Pilipinas (represented by Carlos P. Romulo)…” 

(Why would other countries be loaned gold? It’s simple. In the decision formed by Bretton Woods Conference of 1944 that took place in New Hampshire, USA, which was attended by 44 countries including the Philippines [represented by Carlos P. Romulo]…)

As of writing, the video has been viewed over 829,000 times, and has 44,000 reactions, 2,800 comments, and 34,000 shares.

Another Facebook page, “Filipino Future,” made the same claim about Romulo in two Facebook posts on January 17 and September 5, 2020. As of writing, these two posts have a total of at least 7,200 reactions, 954 comments, and about 5,500 shares. 

The claim is false. 

An entry in the Official Gazette titled “The President’s Day: June 27, 1944” said that former president Manuel Quezon named the following as the Philippine delegates to the Bretton Woods Conference:

• Hon. Andres Soriano, secretary of finance (chairman of the delegation)
• Hon. Jaime Hernandez, auditor-general
• Mr. Joseph Foley, manager of the Philippine National Bank, N. Y. Agency
• Mr. Ismael Mathay, technical assistant to the auditor-general (secretary to the delegation)

Carlos P. Romulo was not among the names that Quezon mentioned.

The Bretton Woods Conference was formally named the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference, which took place from July 1 to 22, 1944, in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, United States.

Volume 1 of the US Department of State publication “PROCEEDINGS AND DOCUMENTS OF THE United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference” also listed Soriano, Hernandez, Foley, and Mathay as the Philippine attendees to the 1944 Bretton Woods Conference. Volume 2 did not mention Mathay but listed down the other 3. Romulo’s name was not mentioned in either volume. 

In the financial history paper “Who Was at Bretton Woods?” on the website of the Center of Financial Stability, the authors Kurt Schuler and Mark Bernkopf said that they are offering “for the first time a nearly complete list” of the attendees to the 1944 Bretton Woods Conference. The paper listed Soriano, Hernandez, Foley, and Mathay as the official Philippine delegates to the conference, without Romulo. Schuler and Bernkopf also listed Delphine Churko as additional staff for the Philippine delegation. 

Romulo, though, did sign the Bretton Woods agreements for the Philippines. The Volume 2 of the document named “United Nations Treaty Series: Treaties and international agreements registered or filed and recorded with the Secretariat of the United Nations” published in 1947 contained both the Bretton Woods agreements for the establishment of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD). Both agreements mentioned Romulo as a signatory with December 27, 1945, and Washington as the date and place of signing.  

Other sources like a short profile of Romulo on the UN website and the March 23, 1957, issue of the Vassar Chronicle also cited 1945 as the year of Romulo’s signing of the Bretton Woods agreements. 

The Bretton Woods Conference laid down a series of rules to foster international monetary stability for the post-World War II period. Aside from the establishment of the IMF and the IBRD (the IBRD would eventually become part of the World Bank), the Bretton Woods system also pegged the US dollar to gold at $35 per ounce, while other countries had an adjustable peg of their currencies to the US dollar.

It is the mention of gold that makes the Bretton Woods Conference a usual inclusion in claims involving the dubious “Marcos gold,” which is the main topic of the false videos and posts of “Ophir” and “Filipino Future.”

Rappler has debunked multiple false claims about the Marcos gold. There have been several fact checks on the Facebook “Filipino Future” as well. – Percival Bueser/Rappler.com

More fact-checks on “Marcos gold”:

• FALSE: Ferdinand Marcos’ Letter of Instruction for Bagong Lipunan currency
• [WATCH] ’Yung Totoo?: Fact check ukol sa kayamanang ginto ng mga Marcos
• FALSE: Philippines is country with highest gold reserves
• FALSE: Marcos family owns a ‘million tons of gold’
• FALSE: Filipino ‘royal family’ ruled over pre-colonial ‘Maharlika kingdom’
• HOAX: Marcos gold bars, jewelry ‘taken by Aquinos,’ opposition

More fact-checks on Facebook page “Filipino Future”:

• FALSE: Marcos was a guerrilla leader during World War II
• FALSE: George W. Bush says Philippines is wealthiest country in the world
• FALSE: Myanmar used Smartmatic machines in 2020 elections
• FALSE: Philippines is rich in water called deuterium
• FALSE: US federal gov’t watermarked ballots for 2020 election
• FALSE: PH economy got worse after Marcos was ousted

This article was written by a volunteer of Rappler’s fact-checking mentorship program, a 5-week exclusive and hands-on training on detecting, investigating, and verifying online misinformation and disinformation.

Keep us aware of suspicious Facebook pages, groups, accounts, websites, articles, or photos in your network by contacting us at factcheck@rappler.com. Let us battle disinformation one Fact Check at a time.

President Rodrigo Duterte is now deciding who the next Philippine chief justice will be, and he will have to choose among one Aquino appointee and two of his own appointees.

The Aquino appointee, Senior Associate Justice Estela Perlas-Bernabe, is currently most senior in the Court and is actually now acting chief justice. If Duterte picks her, he will be honoring seniority which can be a good thing in terms of acceptability to the other 14 justices.

If Duterte goes for either of his appointees, Associate Justice Alexander Gesmundo or Associate Justice Ramon Paul Hernando, it could result in more stability because they would have more years to serve. Bernabe will retire in May 2022, Gesmundo in November 2026, and Hernando in August 2036.

In this episode we will talk about the process of choosing who gets to sit on the Supreme Court Bench, and whether the Judicial and Bar Council (JBC) is accountable for appointees who turn out bad.

We have lawyer Jojo Mejia, a former JBC member, for this episode.

For past podcast episodes:

• Episode 1 Part 1: Supreme Court’s most controversial decisions
• Episode 1 Part 2: Department of Justice’s evolving definition of warrantless arrests
• Episode 2: The rule of law in the time of the coronavirus
• Episode 3: Pandemic and the great wall of free speech
• Episode 4: Will petition to disclose Duterte health work?
• Episode 5: Legal difficulties of a prisoner mass release
• Episode 6: Breaking down the ABS-CBN franchise legal and political issues
• Episode 7: ABS-CBN and the 3 tangled branches of government
• Episode 8: Are extraordinary writs still effective in the time of Duterte?
• Episode 9: Dissecting anti-terror bill and threats to freedoms
• Episode 10: The problems with the Cybercrime Law
• Episode 11: Can we trust the gov’t panel probing drug war deaths?
• Episode 12: Why press freedom is legally protected
• Episode 13: What is People’s Initiative and will it work for ABS-CBN?
• Episode 14: The new push for death penalty
• Episode 15: A State of terror
• Episode 16: GCTA’s thorn – Do bad men deserve good things?
• Episode 17: Policies beyond body count of Duterte’s drug war
• Episode 18: Can we really bring Xi Jinping to the ICC?
• Episode 19: Philippine courts and the death of baby River
• Episode 20: Deep dive into anti-terror law IRR
• Episode 21: Supreme Court and the SALN challenge
• Episode 22: Where PH stands in fight for climate justice
• Episode 23: How to legally fight red-tagging
• Episode 24: Hope for the Rule of Law with Dino de Leon
• Episode 25: Summary of anti-terror law petitions
• Episode 26: May it please the Court – the anti-terror law orals
• Episode 27: Investigating Duterte’s drug war using hard data
• Episode 28: Your Honors, they are killing lawyers

If you have tips and suggestions for episodes, email the host at lian.buan@rappler.com. – Rappler.com

Due to poverty in most parts of the country, many aspire to work in the capital to land a more high-paying job. This was the only dream of Leovil Pelletero, a 19-year-old resident of Zamboanga del Sur. 

Pelletero was killed by Police Corporal Javier Medel after a heated argument in Barangay Canlubang in Calamba, Laguna on the early morning of March 28, 2021 – the celebration of Palm Sunday for Catholics and the same day when labor leader Dandy Miguel was shot dead by unknown assailants. 

In an interview with Rappler, Dahlia* and Jane*, Pelletero’s cousins, narrated his short but selfless life. 

Simple life in Zamboanga

Leovil Brian Gumera Pelletero, or Brian to his loved ones, was born on November 29, 2001 in Zamboanga del Sur. He is the eldest child of his farmer mother and an Overseas Filipino Worker (OFW) father who worked in Saudi Arabia.

Pelletero grew up in Sacbulan, Municipality of San Pablo. Due to poverty, he finished only grade 11 at the San Pablo National High School. 

At an early age, he helped his mother tend the farm to provide additional income. He also worked as an assistant mechanic in a motorcycle repair shop. 

Pelletero was active in religious activities. According to his cousins, he was the president of Zone 6-Parish Youth Apostolate, an organization of youth serving in their parish. He was also a scout member in their municipality. 

Raised by his maternal grandmother until her death, Pelletero was said to be a “lola’s boy.” 

His cousin described him as a lovable and kind person. “Mabait talaga siyang bata. Wala siyang kaaway (He was very kind. He had no conflict with anyone),” Dahlia told Rappler in a phone interview.

Young father and partner

At the age of 18, Pelletero became a father. 

He has an 18-year-old live-in partner and a one-year-old son. He dedicated his blood, sweat, and tears to provide for them. 

When he stopped schooling, Pelletero worked at a bar house in Pagadian City. Then the pandemic came so he had to think of other ways to provide for his family. 

Opportunity knocked when one of his friends invited him to work in Metro Manila. He had to leave his partner and son in Zamboanga del Sur to work as an assistant helper. 

According to his cousin Jane, Pelletero arrived in Quezon City on February 18, 2021. 

“Last February 18 siya dumating at doon sa Quezon City nag-stay for one month but di siya agad nakakuha ng regular na trabaho. (He arrived in Quezon City last February 18 where he stayed for a month but he couldn’t immediately find a regular job),” Jane told Rappler in a message. 

Eventually, Pelletero was invited by their other cousin to work in Calamba, Laguna. 

On March 23, Tuesday, he started working in 99 Blues Sports Apparel, a sportswear business in Laguna, as a helper. And in less than a week in Laguna, while having a little celebration, he was killed by a cop over a heated argument. 

Dahlia insisted that his cousin might be a drinker but he had no conflict with anyone. 

“Mabait talaga siyang bata kaso umiinom. Walang kaaway ‘yan sa Zamboanga. Wala siyang record,” Dahlia said. (He was very kind although he drinks. He had no conflict with anyone in Zamboanga. He had no bad record.)

And now that all of his dreams were shattered by a bullet, his family has a last request. 

“Ang gusto lang kasi namin ay may hustisya. ‘Yun lang po talaga. Hindi po kasi namin matanggap na wala na siya eh. Sobrang sakit po. Sana po makulong po ‘yung pulis na pumatay sa pinsan ko po,” Dahlia said.

(All we want is justice. That’s all. We really can’t accept the fact that he is already dead. It’s so painful. We hope the police who killed him will be jailed.)

Dahlia also has a message to Police Corporal Javier Medel for killing his cousin: “Bahala na po ang Panginoon sa kanya (We leave him to God),” Dahlia said. – Rappler.com

*Names withheld for privacy and their safety

At a glance:

• Claim: Vitamin D treatment for COVID-19 patients can reduce deaths by up to 60%. 
• Rating: FALSE
• The facts: The study cited as a source for this claim has not been peer reviewed. It has also been removed from the preprint website that published it due to investigations into its research methods and results. No clinical trials have conclusively recommended Vitamin D as treatment for COVID-19. 
• Why we fact-checked this: The page “Lynn Channel” on Facebook posted a video with this claim, and the video has garnered over 2,500 reactions, 1,600 comments, and 30,000 views as of writing. 

Complete details:

A video on Facebook page “Lynn Channel” claims that Vitamin D treatment on COVID-19 patients can reduce deaths by up to 60%. 

Lynn Agno, the United Kingdom-based owner of the Facebook page, quoted British politician David Davis in her claim. In a series of tweets on February 14, Davis cited an inconclusive study on Vitamin D as a treatment for COVID-19 patients. The study, titled “Calcifediol Treatment and COVID-19 Related Outcomes,” was published on the “Preprints with The Lancet” website on January 22. The site is an online archive by medical journal The Lancet where pre-printed studies, or studies that have not been peer-reviewed, may be submitted for viewing.

Agno cites the same study in her video to support her claim.

The video was published on March 21 and has garnered over 2,500 reactions, 1,600 comments, and 30,000 views as of writing. Agno also reiterated the claim in a video posted on March 23, which currently has over 3,500 reactions, 2,200 comments, and 43,000 views. 

This claim is false. 

As Vitamin D has been found to boost immune systems and prevent respiratory tract infections, multiple studies have been conducted to determine whether Vitamin D may be effective for treatment or prevention of COVID-19, a respiratory disease. So far, no clinical trials have conclusively recommended it. 

The study cited by Agno in her video has since been removed from the “Preprints with the Lancet” website “due to concerns about the description of the research in this paper.” The concerns have led them to initiate an investigation into the study, they said.

Health experts have also criticized the study and its researchers, urging caution when interpreting the results. Medscape Medical News cited the opinions of experts from Queen Mary University of London, the University of Glasgow, and Yale School of Medicine who say that the study had many limitations.

Adrian Martineau, the chief investigator of the CORONAVIT trial, – the UK’s national clinical study of vitamin D supplementation to reduce risk and/or severity of COVID-19 – also told Medscape Medical News that the study had methodological flaws.

Moreover, “Preprints with the Lancet” also gives the following warning on all their published preprints: “These preprints are early stage research papers that have not been peer-reviewed. The findings should not be used for clinical or public health decision making and should not be presented to a lay audience without highlighting that they are preliminary and have not been peer-reviewed.”

Agno did not specify that this study has not been peer-reviewed and removed from the website due to ongoing investigations on its results.

Agno also referenced an article by The New York Post published on October 27, 2020, that cites another study about how 80% of COVID-19 patients who participated in the research had Vitamin D deficiency. However, this study did not find a difference in death rate between patients who had Vitamin D deficiency and those who did not. “No difference was found regarding the composite severity endpoint nor mortality,” it stated.

Rappler has fact-checked Agno multiple times before. Read more about claims by Agno that we’ve debunked:

• FALSE: COVID-19 pandemic is over, vaccine unnecessary
• FALSE: WHO reverses stance, urges world leaders to lift lockdowns 
• FALSE: 70% of COVID-19 deaths in US from nursing homes 
• FALSE: COVID-19 not deadlier than the flu
• FALSE: Tanzania kicks out World Health Organization 

– Sofia Guanzon/Rappler.com

Sofia Guanzon is a Rappler intern. This fact check was reviewed by a member of Rappler’s research team and a senior editor. Learn more about Rappler’s internship program here.

Keep us aware of suspicious Facebook pages, groups, accounts, websites, articles, or photos in your network by contacting us at factcheck@rappler.com. Let us battle disinformation one Fact Check at a time.