King Charles will receive more cancer treatment in the coming year, official sources at Buckingham Palace told global media Friday.
The official sources said the revelation that Charles’ cancer treatment would not end this year was actually no revelation, and that the “encouraging” and “positive” direction of his treatment was “good news.”
British media, hamstrung by tough privacy rules in the U.K., have typically been reluctant to investigate Charles’ cancer or reveal publicly what they may know on background.
However, nearly a year after news broke of his diagnosis, there are signs that even the most loyal cheerleaders are acknowledging that Charles may not, after all, be immortal.
On Thursday, after William and Kate skipped a traditional royal luncheon, even the fiercely monarchist Daily Telegraph said their decision showed that, “sadly,” they were aware of “the steady march of time” adding, “If William had once expected to have decades ahead of him as the Prince of Wales, his father’s cancer, and the ongoing treatment to keep it at bay, will have been an awakening the likes of which no child wants to experience.”
The London Times said on Friday: “It is clear, however, that cancer has taken its toll both mentally and physically on the King, 76,″ and added that William worried that his “promotion to King” could “come to him at the worst possible time.”
The Daily Beast has consistently reported on the fact that Charles’ cancer has dramatically changed the expectations of royal planners and the behavior of insiders, including his heir.
Charles himself—who has faced the illness with immense bravery by returning to public duties and work—is no fool, of course. On tour in Samoa, he memorably said, without joking, that he hoped “to survive” long enough to visit the region again.
The Daily Beast has candidly reported all year that while Charles is indeed getting the best treatment in the world and fighting the disease courageously, few now expect him to live to his 90s, as his parents did.
The impending death of kings often triggers a collapse of discipline as the monarchy enters a “pre-succession” in which characters jostle for position and try and get their own settlements in place before the big change, and this is happening in the U.K., whether it’s Prince Andrew’s fight to stay in Royal Lodge, Prince Harry’s security, or Queen Camilla’s living arrangements.
The center of gravity also shifts in favor of the new boss, and William, 42, has not been shy about openly discussing his vision for changing the monarchy. He told the Sunday Times royal correspondent, Roya Nikkhah, that he was going to “do it differently, for my generation,” adding: “I’m doing it with maybe a smaller ‘r’ in the royal, if you like. So it’s more about impact, philanthropy, collaboration, convening and helping people.”
The reality is that Charles’ cancer—still unspecified—is now being managed as a long-term condition. While his schedule of public duties, including commitments over Christmas, continues, the old vigor of both Charles, 76, and Camilla, 77, is proving elusive.
Camilla was laid low by a brutal bout of pneumonia after an official trip to Australia and Samoa earlier this year. Palace spinners initially tried to pass this off as a “nasty bug” before Camilla went dramatically off-message and said she had actually contracted pneumonia.
The affair was typical of the problems that arise from the only partially transparent way in which the palace typically handles health news. When Queen Elizabeth II was clearly dying, aides consistently briefed she was suffering from nothing more than “episodic mobility problems.”
Friends have expressed their concerns about Camilla to The Daily Beast.
One friend recently said: “At 77, to be shipped off to the other side of the world to shake hands with thousands of people when your husband has cancer is, quite frankly, too much to ask. Camilla would never complain, and of course she wanted to support her husband, but she never should have been put in that situation. And she got pneumonia as a result. I hope this makes the mandarins sit up and take notice.”
Prince William has spoken publicly about the toll the past year has taken on his family, describing it as “probably the hardest year of my life.”
An official source told The Daily Beast: “The king’s treatment cycle will continue in its very positive direction into the start of 2025” and spoke of the “very encouraging status quo.” The source added that a “full national and international program” begun in late 2024 would continue into 2025.
