1. That the employee shall have notified her employer of her pregnancy and the probable date of her childbirth which notice shall be transmitted to the SSS in accordance with the rules and regulations it may provide;
   
   

2. The payment shall be advanced by the employer in two equal installments within 30 days from the filing of the maternity leave application;
   
   

3. That payment of daily maternity benefits shall be a bar to the recovery of sickness benefits provided by this Act for the same compensable period of 45 days for the same childbirth, abortion or miscarriage;
   
   

4. That the maternity benefits provided under this section shall be paid only for the first four deliveries after March 13, 1973;
   
   

5. That the SSS shall immediately reimburse the employer of 100 percent of the amount of maternity benefits advanced to the employee by the employer upon receipt of satisfactory proof of such payment and legality thereof;
   
   

6. That if an employee should give birth or suffer abortion or miscarriage without the required contributions having been remitted for her by her employer to the SSS, or without the latter having been previously notified by the employer of time of the pregnancy, the employer shall pay to the SSS damages equivalent to the benefits which said employee "would otherwise have been entitled to, and the SSS shall in turn pay such amount to the employees concerned".

You state that when the aforequoted section was first implemented 1978, the Social Security Commission (SSC) construed the term "childbirth" to be different from that of abortion and miscarriage; and, as a consequence, the System under paragraph (3) of SSS circular 103-T, did not extend the limitation imposed on the availment of maternity leave benefits to "abortions" and/or "miscarriages" which the System distinguished from "childbirth". Pertinently, the said SSS circular provides:

3. Maternity benefits shall be paid only for the first four (4) complete deliveries after March 13, 1973. However, abortions and miscarriages shall not be subject to this limitations."

We take it that you construed the term "four deliveries to be synonymous with four "childbirths", so as to miscarriages and abortions" in the computation of the numerical limitation. You raise the query in view of the conflicting views between some members of the SSC and its management on the applicability of the said limitation to "miscarriages and abortions".

Particularly, you state that during the meeting of the SSC on January 25, 1995, some members raised the issue that the limitation on the payment of maternity benefits in the law to four (4) deliveries after March 13, 1973 applies not only to deliveries but also to abortions or miscarriages. The Management, however, maintains the view that such limitation of payment of maternity leave benefits does not apply to abortions and miscarriages, which should not be included in the computation.

We concur with the view of SSS Management on the issue under consideration.

The Management asserts that the terms "deliver", "abortion" and "miscarriage" are not synonymous terms but have different meanings, particularly, that the term "delivery" has been defined as the expulsion or extraction of the child and fetal membranes at birth, while "abortion" is the expulsion from the uterus of the products of contraception before the fetus is viable, and that a "miscarriage" occurs when the body rejects the embryo or developing fetus for whatever reason.

We agree with the above-stated Management position. The differences in the usual signification of the terms referred to are well-settled. The term "delivery" means the "act of giving birth", whereas the term "abortion" means "the expulsion of a nonviable fetus"; or the "expulsion of human fetus before it is viable especially between the 12^th and 28^th weeks of gestation" (see Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Springfield, Massachusetts, U.S.A., 1964). Incidentally, to stress the distinction among the said terms, it may be mentioned that the term "premature delivery" is said to mean "expulsion of the human fetus after the 28^th week of gestation but before the normal time" (Ibid.).

Examination of the above-quoted provision of paragraph (d) of Section 14-A of R.A. No. 1161, as amended, shows that only the term "deliveries" is employed or used in the provision containing the limitation of the number of times maternity benefits can be availed or after March 13, 1973. It is a cardinal rule in statutory construction that the express mention of one person or consequence implies the exclusion of all others. "Inclusio unius est exclusio alterius" (Acosta v. Flor, 5 Phil. 18).