That Viral Photo of Queen Elizabeth Shaking Trudeau’s Hand is Fake

Have you seen that photograph of Queen Elizabeth II together with her head hanging abnormally low as she shakes the hand of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau? It’s been going viral over the previous day on platforms like Twitter and Facebook. But it’s fully pretend.

Yes, the 95-year-old Queen actually did meet with Trudeau on March 7 at Windsor Castle, her new “permanent residence” in keeping with the British press. She received’t be heading to Buckingham Palace anymore and greeted Trudeau on Monday in her first in-person assembly with a world chief because the pandemic started.

But the picture that’s gotten so popular on social media websites has been photoshopped, and poorly at that. The actual photograph was taken by a pool photographer for the AFP information company and distributed by means of different information organizations.

So-called “pool” photographers confer with when there’s not sufficient room in a selected location to comfortably accommodate a big group of photographers. Only one particular person is shipped to the occasion and shares their pictures with different information organizations.

You can see the unique photograph posted on-line at Getty Images and the Associated Press. The British Monarchy additionally revealed a duplicate of the photograph by itself Facebook page.

There are additionally different pictures displaying Trudeau and the Queen collectively from Monday. And you can clearly see the queen in a much less “hunched” place within the different pictures taken throughout their go to.

It’s not clear what the 2 talked about throughout their assembly, although Prime Minister Trudeau is in Europe to debate Russia’s invasion of Ukraine with UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte.

But why did somebody alter this explicit picture to make the Queen look extra frail than she actually is in the intervening time? It’s seemingly as a result of there’s a well-liked conspiracy concept on-line that’s gained steam claiming Queen Elizabeth really died in late 2021 or early 2022.

The Queen had an in a single day keep on the hospital on October 20, 2021, although it’s not clear what she was handled for, and had already been seen utilizing a cane earlier that month. Some conspiracy theorists on-line imagine that’s when she died and was both changed with a look-alike (this one is widespread with QAnon-obsessed weirdos) or all pictures of her after the hospital go to are pretend.

The Queen contracted covid-19 on Feb. 20, 2022, in yet one more occasion that bought web conspiracy theorists within the risk that her demise can be introduced shortly. But she recovered, because of being vaccinated.

Queen Elizabeth II is 95 years previous and will die at any second, simply as anybody may. But she’s alive and nicely, so far as we all know proper now. And although she will look fairly frail at occasions, keep skeptical of pictures on-line that seem out of the bizarre. This one already has thousands of retweets and tens of thousands of likes. But it’s fully pretend.