Michele Lenore Frazier Baldwin (October 6, 1966 – February 5, 2012), also known as Lady Ganga, was an American who set a world record in standup paddleboarding by paddling 700 miles (1,100 km) down the Ganges in India after being diagnosed with terminal cervical cancer in 2011.

According to her father, Kendrick Frazier, Baldwin always loved the water[1] and gave up her pursuit of a college degree to become a kayak instructor and river guide on the Rio Grande.

[1][7] Baldwin had gone 10 years without a cervical screening test (pap smear), twice canceling, partially due to the expense, since she had no health insurance.

[3] Following a recurrence of the cancer for the third time, now stage 4, and a predicted life expectancy of three to six months, she traveled to California to visit a childhood friend, where she learned to standup paddleboard.

[1][7] After learning to paddleboard, Baldwin decided to undertake an expedition on the Ganges River to bring attention to preventable cancer,[7][9] despite being advised by friends and medical practitioners that being on her feet every day for a month was not a good idea.

Baldwin's friend and filmmaker, Nat Stone, documented her expedition, which started at Rishikesh and ended in the Hindu holy city of Varanasi.

[11][3][8][12] Her hope was that through her story, women would not delay having regular pap tests, as she had done, and that parents would ensure their children receive the HPV vaccine.

[6] Filmmakers Mark Hefti and Fredric Lumiere approached Baldwin, shortly after her return from India, about being featured, along with other women, in the documentary film called Someone You Love: The HPV Epidemic which was released in 2014.

Lumiere found her story "exotic and epic"[13] and "it was about even more than cervical cancer, it was about accepting your destiny, coming to peace with it, and doing something incredible with your life".

When the team went to India to do more filming, they showed a six-minute version of the video called Lady Ganga to the residents of a mountain village in the region of Ladakh.

[17][18] In 2017, Bulova created a special-edition watch to pay tribute to Baldwin and to help raise money for and awareness of cervical cancer.

[19] The first Lady Ganga Trailblazer Award was presented in honor of Baldwin on October 5, 2018, at the 32nd International IPVS conference in Sydney, Australia.

[20] The award was presented by Dr. Shobha S. Krishnan, Founder and President of the Global Initiative Against HPV and Cervical Cancer (GIAHC) and was shared by Drs.

[21] In 2019, the award went to Miriam Cremer, a board-certified obstetrician and gynecologist and the president and founder of Basic Health International (BHI), a group that is focussed on eradicating cervical cancer around the world.