Actor Lee Hye-young, battling lung cancer, pushes back against smoker stigma: 'Non-smokers get it too'

Actor Lee Hye-young has opened up about changes to her daily life and health since her lung cancer diagnosis.

A video titled "Lee Hye-young, a Daughter of a Korean War Veteran and an Incheon Native" was posted Friday on her YouTube channel "Hyeyoung Is Unstoppable."

In the video, Lee visited her father's grave at Seoul National Cemetery in Incheon.

When passersby asked how she was doing, she said filming YouTube videos seemed to be helping her health and that she felt heartbroken reading comments from people in situations similar to her own.

Lee said she had come across comments from people who went through a difficult time after being diagnosed with lung cancer despite never having smoked. "Non-smokers get lung cancer too. You can get lung cancer even if you have never smoked," she said.

She added that just as not only daily drinkers develop stomach cancer or only people with constipation develop colon cancer, she believed the parts of the body most vulnerable to stress tend to be where cancer takes hold.

Lee also urged the public not to assume that anyone diagnosed with lung cancer must have been a heavy smoker. "Please don't look at someone with lung cancer and think, 'Were they a chain smoker?' People who are sick carry their own pain, so please be kind," she said.

Lee was first diagnosed with early-stage lung cancer in 2021 and has been managing her condition since. In 2023, she appeared on the MBC entertainment program "Radio Star" and said she had undergone lung resection surgery without chemotherapy and was under follow-up monitoring.