Kate Middleton news: Princess of Wales 'not ruled out' of Trooping the Colour

The Princess of Wales may yet make a public appearance this year, it has been speculated.

Kate has not been seen in public since Christmas Day, when she attended the traditional Sandringham church service with her family. Since then, she was admitted for “planned” abdominal surgery on January 16, after which she was expected to be in hospital for about a fortnight.

It was the same time that King Charles was admitted for what was a routine procedure to correct a “benign prostate enlargement”. Subsequent tests revealed he had cancer, although no further details have been released.

The Princess was originally expected to be back on royal duties at Easter, but after a period of time in which the only sign of her were grainy pictures of a figure seen in her mother’s car and a couple said to be her and Prince William at a farm shop - and a Mother’s Day picture which caused controversy after it was discovered to have been digitally manipulated - she released a video confirming that she too was undergoing cancer treatment.

As with the King, the type of cancer has not been revealed. Kate was filmed on a bench, explaining that while her surgery had gone well, tests later discovered that “cancer had been present”. With this in mind, her medical team advised that she should undergo a course of “preventative chemotherapy”, she said. Looking gaunter than usual, and speaking in a measured, if not stilted way, she explained in part what had happened in the first few months of the year.

Last week, friends and royal sources told a Daily Beast reporter that Kate was not expected to be seen for the rest of the year. She will definitely not attend the Colonel’s Review next weekend, the main rehearsal for Trooping the Colour in mid-June. As colonel-in-chief of the Irish Guards, this would be very much one of her usual duties. But now reports emerging suggest that she could in fact attend Trooping the Colour - or at least Kensington Palace has not ruled this out, says the Mirror. It comes after friends told Vanity Fair this week that Kate is “feeling much better”.

The King, whose “second” birthday Trooping the Colour marks, has said he will attend this year but in a carriage, rather than on horseback as he did last year when inspecting the troops.

There have been slightly conflicting reports about the Princess’s health. On the one hand, it has been suggested that she may not return to royal duties until 2025, and that she has been told that she will need the all-clear by royal doctors before re-emerging into public life.

On the other hand, People.com reported last week, in a story that was picked up by the wider media, although without any concrete evidence, that she had been seen “out and about” running errands in the around Sandringham, which is where the family has relocated for the summer.

The Palace has said that the Princess has also been been keeping a keen eye on her charity The Royal Foundation Business Taskforce for Early Childhood, which she launched in March last year, and which released a report last month. She is said to be involved, but the extent of this is not clear, and she did not appear in any publicity surrounding the report. When the report was released, Kensington Palace clarified that it did not signify the Princess returning to work, and said she would only do so when doctors gave her the green light to do so.

Meanwhile, Prince William has returned to royal duties - although these have been scaled back in the lead-up to the July 4 General Election - but the younger children Charlotte and Louis have not been seen either.

The Princess’s absence in February and early March caused a gap in which conspiracy theories flourished online. The continuing absence has, as Sky news anchor Kay Burley notes, seen that vacuum begin to grow again. The alleged estrangement of Prince Harry and Prince William has not helped, in that some commentators appear to have “picked sides” over the brothers. Many of the theories propounded online are spiteful, and lots are, surely, way off the mark. But the fact that they are unpublishable by any reputable publication - or any journalist with ethics and a conscience - means that the more extreme people who take social media posts as fact are only inspired to speculate further.

As a public and publicly-funded figure it is possible to argue that there are questions to be asked of the Princess’s engagements and health. But at all times, when asking those questions, it must be remembered that the subject is the mother of three young children, diagnosed with what for all we know may be a potentially fatal disease. The world, on the whole well-wishing, awaits what Kensington Palace reveals next, and hopes for good news.