First City Monument Bank has reacted to the viral video of a customer dying while using an ATM machine at one of its Lagos branches. 

Nigerian financial institution, FCMB has released a press statement debunking reports that a customer using the ATM service in one of its branches slumped after exhibiting Covid-19 symptoms.

In the statement released on Tuesday, FCMB claimed that the customer at their Onipanu branch slumped from hunger-induced exhaustion and did not exhibit any Covid-19 symptoms as reported by social media.

FCMB further revealed that upon slumping, the customer was carried to the bank’s security post where he was revived and fed. He reportedly walked out of the bank by himself.

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We understand the panic a 13-second video such as currently making the rounds can cause without the proper context at such a time as this. The current outbreak of COVID-19 has led to an unprecedented health situation and anxiety all around the world, including in Nigeria, where community transmission continues to rise. Ideally, this current anxiety should not be amplified by unverified, dramatic and purely hypothetical social media stories. We need to channel our energies towards curtailing the spread of the pandemic and ultimately, eradicating it entirely. FCMB is at the forefront of the drive to achieve these two objectives. We have deployed robust health and safety measures at all our open branches including making use of face masks by customers and staff mandatory; checking of temperature before admittance into our premises; provision of hand sanitizers which must be used before entry into the banking halls and ATM areas; hourly disinfecting of teller counters and customer service tables; and ensuring social distance is maintained at all times. We assure the public that we will remain unwavering in our commitment to doing all we can to safeguard our customers, employees and communities." #FCMB #MyBankAndI

A post shared by FCMB (@myfcmb) on May 4, 2020 at 4:17pm PDT