At 76 and dealing with cancer, no one would blame King Charles for staying home and resting during the busy royal holiday season. But The King carried on with business as usual on Friday, Dec. 20 during his last public engagement before Christmas—and issued a punchy health update in the process.
King Charles and Queen Camilla visited the London borough of Walthamstow to "celebrate community cohesion" and meet local leaders and young people. When asked by Harvinder Rattan, a Sikh faith representative, how he was doing, The King quipped (per the Mirror), "I'm still alive."
His joke follows another update on The King's health, as it was announced on Friday morning that His Majesty's cancer treatments would continue into 2025. As reported by Sky News, a palace source revealed the monarch "has been moving in a positive direction and as a managed condition the treatment cycle will continue into next year."
Sky News continued that "the source added there is a sense of optimism, which can be seen in The King's desire to keep up a busy schedule of public engagements, including during the festive period."
The King met with members of the community in Walthamstow.
King Charles announced he'd been diagnosed with an undisclosed form of cancer in February after undergoing a procedure for an enlarged prostate, although the conditions were confirmed by the palace to be unrelated.
Queen Camilla serves as president of cancer support charity Maggie's, and its chief executive, Dame Laura Lee, told Sky News that "it's not surprising at all" for The King's course of cancer therapies to be stretched out into 2025.
"It's very common for treatment to be ongoing for very long periods of time, as is the treatment that the Princess of Wales went through, which is an intense period of treatment over a year, and then it comes to a point where it's on an end, and she's on that recovery from some of the impacts of her treatment," Lee said.
"So we've got immunotherapy, chemotherapy, surgery, hormone therapy," she added. "There are all sorts of different treatment modalities."
As for The King's packed holiday schedule, he'll head to Sandringham to enjoy Christmas with 45 members of the Royal Family, but brother Prince Andrew will be staying home amid his recent "Chinese spy" scandal.
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