\n<\/p>\n
The queen has spoken for the first time of how difficult she found it to keep King Charles\u2019s cancer a secret before it was announced publicly.<\/p>\n
Camilla found herself \u201clonging to let it out\u201d during an official visit to a Maggie\u2019s cancer support centre in 2024, after Charles had received his diagnosis but before the news was released.<\/p>\n
Speaking in a short film, released on the royal family and Maggie\u2019s YouTube channels on Wednesday, to mark the charity\u2019s 30th anniversary, Camilla said she \u201calmost said something\u201d but knew she couldn\u2019t when, as Maggie\u2019s president, she launched its new centre at the Royal Free hospital in London on 31 January 2024.<\/p>\n
Maggie\u2019s provides free emotional and practical support to cancer patients and their loved-ones at 27 drop-in centres positioned near NHS hospitals across the UK.<\/p>\n
At the time of Camilla\u2019s visit, Charles was recovering from treatment for an enlarged prostate but, as the film reveals, had already been diagnosed with an undisclosed form of cancer, which was eventually announced by Buckingham Palace five days later on 5 February.<\/p>\n
\u201cI remember coming to see a Maggie\u2019s just after the king being diagnosed. Nobody could say anything at the time. That was quite difficult,\u201d she told Maggie\u2019s chief executive, Dame Laura Lee, who was filmed in conversation with Camilla at Clarence House.<\/p>\n
\u201cI almost said something but, you know, I felt that it wasn\u2019t the time to say.<\/p>\n
\u201c[I] looked at everybody who was suffering and all the relations and I think it made me realise even more how important these places were.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/span>Camilla meets volunteers and visitors at the Maggie\u2019s centre near London\u2019s Royal Free hospital.<\/span> Photograph: Paul Grover\/Daily Telegraph\/PA<\/p>\n She told Lee: \u201cI was just longing to let it out but obviously I couldn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n Talking to visitors at the centre during the engagement, she said she was \u201calmost questioning them\u201d, but she did not \u201cwant to pry too deeply\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cBut normally when I went in, I was just talking to them, but I don\u2019t know, I felt it was much more deep,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Charles returned to public-facing engagements in April 2024, less than three months after his treatment began. Speaking of his refusal to slow down, Camilla said: \u201cLook at my husband. Nothing stopped him. He just said, \u2018This is my way. I\u2019m going to cope with it.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n She added: \u201cIt had never really come back to roost at home, and suddenly your husband is diagnosed, and you think \u2018Goodness I\u2019ve been talking to all these people and now I\u2019m the one with some relation, who\u2019s got to help to look after my poor husband and try and understand it all.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Camilla released the seven-minute film to highlight the vital support Maggie\u2019s offers cancer patients, and to promote the services they provide for relatives and especially to men who may be more reluctant to seek help.<\/p>\n She called on every hospital to have a Maggie\u2019s centre. Maggie\u2019s has 27 centres across the UK, built in the grounds of major NHS cancer hospitals, and supports hundreds of thousands of people each year.<\/p>\n The organisation offers care for people affected by cancer, including free psychological, emotional and practical support, with no appointments necessary for the drop-in sessions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The queen has spoken for the first time of how difficult she found it to keep King Charles\u2019s cancer a secret before it was announced publicly. Camilla found herself \u201clonging to let it out\u201d during an official visit to a Maggie\u2019s cancer support centre in 2024, after Charles had received his diagnosis but before the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":51844,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[12166,19248,654,1822,4722,107,2040,1877,1850],"class_list":{"0":"post-51843","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-announcement","9":"tag-camilla","10":"tag-cancer","11":"tag-diagnosis","12":"tag-difficult","13":"tag-keeping","14":"tag-kings","15":"tag-private","16":"tag-queen"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51843","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=51843"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51843\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/51844"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=51843"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=51843"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=51843"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}