Claim: Filipino physician Rocky Willis promotes the use of Bee Venom Advanced Joint and Bone Care Cream, a product that claims to relieve bone and joint pain.
Rating: FALSE
Why we fact-checked this: The post containing the claim was posted by a Facebook page named “UP PGH – Philippine General Hospital News” on November 12 and continues to circulate online. It has 5.1 million views, 37,000 reactions, and 5,500 comments as of writing.
The video shows Willis supposedly promoting the product and advising its use once or twice daily for two weeks to relieve joint and bone pain. A link to purchase the cream is included in the caption.
The facts: The page that posted the video is not an official page of the PGH. The video is also fake and manipulated using artificial intelligence (AI).
On his Facebook account, Willis denied the authenticity of the video.
“This AI-generated video used my content without permission to promote a product I have no affiliation with. Don’t be fooled – it’s not me. Be critical and observant! Please report the Bee Venom,” Willis said in Filipino in a post on November 11.
Deepfake detection tools, like Sensity and TrueMedia.org, also flagged the video as suspicious and found substantial evidence of manipulation.
TrueMedia.org detected manipulation of faces with a 74% confidence level, while AI-generated audio was detected with 99% certainty.
Meanwhile, Sensity also found face manipulation with a 69% confidence level, and audio manipulation with 57.2% certainty. According to Sensity, analyses of content with a confidence level of over 50% indicate clear signs of AI manipulation.
Not FDA registered: Bee Venom Advanced Joint and Bone Care Cream is not on the Philippine Food and Drug Administration’s list of registered products.
Debunked: Rappler has previously debunked deepfake promotional ads of Bee Venom that used the images of other known physicians, such as Tony Leachon, Geraldine Zamora, and Gary Sy, without their consent.
Other promotional ads of the same product posted by fake PGH pages have been fact-checked too. Earlier this month, a video of Senator Raffy Tulfo was also used in a deepfake ad for the supposed joint pain cream. – Ailla Dela Cruz/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.