Short answer. At least one month's salary, or half a month's salary for every year of service, whichever is greater. Article 284 sets that as the floor, and a fraction of at least six months counts as a whole year in the computation. Anything less does not meet the provision.
What the law says
he is paid separation pay equivalent to at least one (1) month salary or to one-half (1/2) month salary for every year of service, whichever is greater, a fraction of at least six (6) months being considered as one (1) whole year
Labor Code, Article 284 — Disease As A Ground. Read the full provision →
Two figures, and you take the larger
The provision asks you to work out two amounts and compare them. The first is one month's salary, flat, regardless of length of service. The second is half a month's salary multiplied by your years of service. The article then says whichever is greater. For shorter service the flat month wins, because half a month times a small number of years comes to less. Somewhere past four years of service the second figure overtakes it and keeps growing. Working out both and taking the higher is the whole calculation.
The six-month rounding rule
The sentence ends with a rule that is easy to miss and worth real money: a fraction of at least six (6) months being considered as one (1) whole year. So service of six years and seven months is counted as seven years, not six. Service of six years and four months stays at six. Because each rounded year adds half a month's salary, this single clause frequently decides whether an offer is correct. Check the dates on your own record before accepting a figure, since employers often compute on completed years alone.
This is a floor, not a ceiling
The article says at least. A collective agreement, a company retirement or separation plan, or the terms of your own contract may provide more, and where they do, the better figure governs. The statutory amount is the minimum the law will not let an employer go below when it terminates on this ground. It is also worth noting what the payment is not: it is not a settlement of everything owed to you, and it stands separate from wages already earned, unused leave conversions and other benefits due on separation.
The payment is a condition of the dismissal
Read how the sentence is built. The employer may terminate on this ground provided that the separation pay is paid — the money is not a courtesy that follows the dismissal but a condition attached to the employer's power to make it. That framing matters if you have been let go for illness and paid nothing, or paid an amount that does not match either formula. Keep your payslips and your dated record of service, because the salary rate applied and the years counted are the two inputs a lawyer will want to check first.