As soon as Buckingham Palace begrudgingly admitted that Queen Elizabeth was hospitalized overnight last week – and that the palace had covered it up – there’s been a pretty interesting conversation happening in the British papers about how QEII needs to take a larger break from public view. Basically, almost every royal commentator is of the opinion that the Queen needs to cull her schedule down to only a handful of big appearances, like Remembrance Day and the opening of COP26, the UN climate conference in Glasgow. COP26 will technically start on Sunday, but I think that’s just for the opening dinner or something like that. The real conference doesn’t begin in earnest until November 1st. The Queen had been scheduled to appear at the start, and they were holding that appearance up as make-or-break for the Queen. Well, the palace announced that she’s not going.
Queen Elizabeth II will “regretfully” not attend a reception at next week’s key climate conference in Glasgow following advice to rest, Buckingham Palace announced on Tuesday. A Palace spokesman said the Queen has ‘regretfully decided that she will no longer travel to Glasgow to attend the evening reception’. With the head of state missing from the event, it is hoped no world leaders will use her absence as a reason not to attend the summit, after it emerged that Xi Jinping – president of China, now the planet’s biggest polluter – is skipping the conference.
Last week a Buckingham Palace spokesman said the 95-year-old monarch was admitted for “preliminary investigations” after she followed doctor’s orders to cancel the trip and rest. A source close to the palace told CNN at the time that her stay in the hospital was “not Covid related.”
The Queen was expected to attend an evening reception in Glasgow on Monday. Buckingham Palace said she will instead deliver an address to the assembled delegates via a recorded video message.
[From CNN and the Daily Mail]
First of all, good! I’m glad they took this off QEII’s schedule. They should have cancelled her appearance as soon as she got out of the hospital – it was absurd to try to guilt-trip a 95-year-old woman to travel AND make speeches AND entertain world leaders. It was especially absurd given the fact that Prince Charles, Camilla, William and Kate are all scheduled to appear at the conference as well. Surely the “fab four” can bring the environmental glam to a dreary Glasgow conference? Also: do you think Will and Kate will go straight to Glasgow from their vacation?
As for the recorded video message – it still seems like she’s fine when she’s seated. It’s the walking around, standing and getting up that’s the problem. My guess is that she’ll be seated for the prerecorded video.
Photos courtesy of Backgrid and Avalon Red.
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