Prince William has revealed that he didn’t attend the Paris 2024 Olympics because he was afraid of bringing Covid home to his wife, the Princess of Wales, who was undergoing chemotherapy at the time.
Instead, William, 42, and his family watched all the sporting action on his TV, adding: “We were glued to it every day.”
The heir to the throne made the comments on a visit to a community pool in Birtley, north-east England, on Thursday to highlight the Royal Foundation’s new work to boost access to swimming.
The pool was closed due to council budget cuts but reopened last month after fundraising £400,000 from crowdfunding, the government and Sports England – as well as an undisclosed donation from the Royal Foundation.
William arrived to dozens of well-wishers, prompting the royal to take part in an impromptu walkabout before heading inside to meet Olympic and Paralympic swimmers.
He was introduced to Paris 2024 Olympians Adam Peaty and Tom Dean and Paralympians Maisie Summers-Newton and Louise Fiddes, who showcased their medals.
Tom asked the Prince: “Did you manage to get out there [to Paris]?”
But William responded: “No I was so keen to come but I have to say after reading someone’s interview about Covid [looking at Adam Peaty – who tested positive during the games] I decided, because my wife was obviously having chemo, that I didn’t want to risk bringing Covid home, so Adam very kindly reminded me that that was still a thing! But we watched the whole thing. We were glued to it every day.”
The Paris Olympics took place from July 26 to August 11, with the Paralympics starting two weeks later. At the time the princess was still undergoing gruelling chemotherapy treatment – which weakens the immune system.
Since then, the princess revealed that she has completed her course of chemotherapy and has started a gradual return to royal duties by holding some meetings.
On Wednesday, Kensington Palace sharedimages of Kate and William holding a private meeting with a 16-year-old who is battling a rare and aggressive form of cancer.
During his chat with the athletes, William revealed that their eldest son Prince George, 11, shared the couple’s enthusiasm for swimming.
“Catherine and I both adore swimming,” he said. “George loves scuba diving. He was 10 years old, we took him under, thinking he’d freak out, but he absolutely loved it. It’s just introduced him to the world of water.”
He also shared his commiserations that Tom’s Strictly Come Dancing journey came to an end.
“Robbery was the word he used, very kind of him,” said Tom, who added that William said his wife Catherine was a ‘big fan’ of the show.
Elsewhere on the visit, the prince discussed the impact of community pools closing down.
Prince William said: “We’ve heard stories up and down the countries of pools closing down, so we thought: ‘no, we want to be able to stop this’. We want to replicate this [Birtley’s pool re-opening] across the country because swimming is such an important part of life. We’re an island nation, we should all have access to learn how to swim.”
On Thursday, the Royal Foundation of the Prince and Princess of Wales announced a new partnership with the Birtley Community Pool to provide swimming lessons and lifeguard training.
Almost one in three children in the UK currently leave primary education unable to swim, according to a report from Swim England in May 2021.
As well as funding Birtley’s pool, the Royal Foundation also announced they were forming a partnership with Tom’s company ‘Swim School’ to provide 1,000 ‘learn to swim packages’ to children across the UK next year.
