Kate Middleton Rep Subtly Rewrites Her Plans For Public Return & Alarm Bells Are Going Off

Since Kate Middleton revealed her cancer diagnosis, royalists have become Waity Katie sentinels who've watched the weeks tick by with no update on when they'll see the princess in public again. Courtesy of a Kensington Palace rep, they now know that Catherine, Princess of Wales, is capable of spearheading a project — but she also has no plans to resume her official royal duties anytime soon. So, the waters have been muddied even more amid continued speculation about Kate's disappearance.

In Kate's April 2024 video about undergoing preventative chemotherapy, she said, "My work has always brought me a deep sense of joy, and I look forward to being back when I'm able." According to her spokesperson, she has been "able" to work on her early years campaign from home. Per the Daily Mail, the Royal Foundation Business Taskforce for Early Childhood released its findings that the British economy would get a major boost from supporting early childhood initiatives, such as making childcare more obtainable for those in the workforce. "The Princess of Wales was the driving force behind the business task force," the palace rep said. 

Being a "driving force" usually means taking an active role in something to ensure it gets done — the use of the term paints a picture of Kate strategizing with her team and taking meetings with businesses to get them on board with her project. But apparently, she's still not well enough to be the public face of the campaign.

In the same breath where they described Kate Middleton as being the "driving force" of the early childhood task force, the palace rep downplayed her contributions to its latest report. "She has been kept up to date since the inception of the task force and she has read the report and been briefed on it," the spokesperson added. So, others did the work and she simply read about it? Gotcha.

From the sound of it, the rep doesn't want to make it seem as if Kate is working too hard from home because people would then wonder why she's capable of doing that, but not posing for pictures at royal engagements. If this was their ploy, it isn't working. "If she is well enough to work she is well enough to see the public!" tweeted one skeptic of the latest Kate update. The video of Kate happily shopping in Windsor procured by The Sun also helped her critics make such a case.

But Kensington Palace has someone else it can conveniently blame for Kate's continued absence. "She will return to work when she has had the green light from doctors," her rep told the Daily Mail. As reported by the BBC, King Charles III was given the A-okay to return to work three months after he underwent prostate surgery in February and he did so while still undergoing treatment for his cancer. Kate's closely guarded abdominal surgery was in January.