King Charles' strategic health announcement was planned to protect Kate Middleton and take some of the heat of her following her own health announcement.
On January 17th the Royal Family made two surprising announcements as it was revealed King Charles has begun treatment for a 'benign' prostate condition and that Kate Middleton is in hospital recovering from a 'planned surgery'. While the public was shocked by these announcements, some experts have claimed that this was a deliberate decision from King Charles as a way to 'protect Kate'.
Historian and author, Tessa Dunlop, told OK!, "I think they clearly did do it deliberately, they will have waited until Kate's operation was successful and they would have thought 'let's shift the attention slightly away from that and the speculation', so they'd cap it with Charles' which was a more procedural operation, less significant and one where he could use his public service role to remind men of a certain age to get their prostate checked."
The expert then explained that the announcement was designed to "shift some of the narrative" away from Kate's medical issues. "Even if everyone is more interested in Kate, he is the King. By saying what Charles' condition is, that also takes up a bit of the 'oxygen'," she said.
"They'll share with us Charles's condition, but not Kate's and that's their prerogative, I think it is also designed to protect Kate," she said.
Tess explained that the Princess of Wales is too important to the Royal Family and the King will make sure that she is taken care of. "He knows how vital Kate is, she's a vital cog in the royal machine," said Tess."The main message to the Royal Family is don't take Kate for granted, she's their workhorse and their show pony - she is someone they really do need to take care of."
The expert added that the Prince and Princess of Wales are a top priority for the Royal Family. "They need Kate and William to be on 'full cylinders', they’re very aware of the pair and are over-dependent on them so they need them both backup and running," said Tess."Kate needs to be fully better, they've got the 'big gigs' out the way, they've got Christmas out the way, they've done the coronation, they've buried the Queen, they can take a bit of time to recover."
"Arguably it's ideal timing, it might have even been planned as both were planned procedures", she then concluded, "It's a very quiet time of year."
On January 18th, Queen Camilla gave a health update on her husband and said, "He’s fine, thank you very much. Looking forward to getting back to work."
Similarly, Kate was supported by her partner as Prince William was snapped driving to visit Kate at the hospital. It is thought that the King will return to work in the next few weeks and the Princess of Wales will be back at engagements around Easter.
