King Charles III announces an improvement and a reduction in his cancer treatment

LondonIn a message that was nothing short of exceptional, King Charles III revealed this Friday evening a "reduction for next year" in his treatment against the cancer he has"A milestone that is both a personal blessing and a testament to the remarkable progress that has been made in cancer care in recent years," he said during a recorded address broadcast shortly after 8 p.m. on Channel 4. His words opened the special broadcast. Starting in January, the King of England will enter what the Royal Household has described as a "precautionary" phase, having "responded exceptionally well" to the therapy. The duration of this new phase will depend solely on medical judgment. In his speech, the monarch directly appealed to citizens to do their part in the fight against cancer and encouraged them to participate in public health screening programs: "Early detection is key and can transform treatment processes, giving medical teams time to respond." Charles III confessed that he knows "from personal experience" the devastating impact of a diagnosis, but also the importance of identifying the disease early. He explained that this has allowed him "to continue leading a full and active life, even while undergoing treatment." At no point, however, has he revealed the type of cancer he has had since February 2014, but sources at Buckingham Palace have confirmed that it is not prostate cancer, even though surgery at the end of January of that year detected a benign enlargement of the prostate. A few weeks after Charles III moved the British public with his diagnosis, Kate Middleton, the wife of Prince William and future queen, announced that he also had cancerAnd almost exactly a year ago, in January 2025, the Princess commented, as the King did today, that her illness was in remission.

Charles III's message has focused on a fact that, in his words, "deeply concerns" him: at least nine million people in the United Kingdom are not up to date with available screening tests. "That's nine million missed opportunities to detect cancer early," he lamented. And he has used the available statistics to urge his subjects to get tested. If colon cancer is detected in its early stages, nine out of ten patients survive at least five years; if it is diagnosed late, only one in ten does. In this regard, the British have had access for just a few weeks to the digital tool Screening Checker, developed by Cancer Research UK and Channel 4, which allows users to easily check which screening tests are available to them based on their age.

The King's message comes at a time when the UK is debating the possible expansion or advisability of prostate cancer screenings. The palace maintains that Charles III does not wish to influence the debate and that his appeal is solely to encourage the use of existing tests: breast, colon, and cervical cancer screenings. His decision to participate tonight in the Channel 4 campaign follows the positive impact of the announcement, at the end of January 2024, that the King had undergone benign prostate enlargement treatment: as a result, inquiries on the NHS website about prostate conditions and prostate cancer risk factors from Prostate Cancer UK nearly doubled.

The King concluded his message with a heartfelt thank you to the doctors, nurses, researchers, and volunteers who "light up the darkest moments of illness," and urged the public to include a commitment to screening among their New Year's resolutions. "Your life—or the life of someone who wants to—may depend on it," he warned.