Indian actress ‘dies’ for a day - 26th February 2024

An Indian actress died of cancer. People saw this story on Instagram. TV channels shared the news. But it wasn’t true.

The actress is Poonam Pandey. The next day, she spoke about cervical cancer in a video. This disease kills 77,000 women in India every year. Pandey wanted to teach people about it.

There’s a vaccine to stop this disease. It stops the HPV virus (human papillomavirus). Cervical cancer usually comes from this virus.

India’s government is starting to use the vaccine. It wants to give the vaccine to girls from 9 to 14 years old. Pandey’s story comes at the same time. Did the government know about it?

Some people like Pandey’s idea. Everyone can learn about cervical cancer. This will save lives.

Other people are angry. Pandey got a lot of likes. But it wasn’t a nice way to teach people about cancer.

Internet searches about cervical cancer went up. But, does this make it OK?