The once-mischievous heir to the throne told a respiratory nurse he had indulged in the habit as a youngster, but “a few cigarettes behind a chicken coop” were enough to lead him to quit.
At an event celebrating the work of nurses held at Clarence House, the Prince of Wales asked a group of respiratory nurse whether they worked with a lot of smokers.
“I gave up at 11 when I had a few cigarettes behind a chicken coop,” he jokingly told one nurse, who believed his remarks to be tongue-in-cheek.
It’s not the first time the Prince has made light of his early habit, sharing the same story with a group of school children in 1999.
“The good thing is to give them up when you are young,” he told the group of Slovenian pupils who erupted in laughter.
Charles’s son Prince Harry appears not to have taken his father’s advice — the rebellious Prince has long been a casual smoker. The Duchess of Cornwall, Charles’s wife, was once a heavy smoker but it said to have given up years ago.
Prince Charles, who is patron of more than 30 healthcare organisations, made his remarks at the Nursing Times Awards, recognising the pivotal role nurses play in healthcare.
“In general, quite apart from the medical expertise that nursing staff provide on a daily and nightly basis, the reassurance and simple human kindness that they can also dispense is, I believe, vital and must surely impact positively on the recovery of individuals,” he wrote in Nursing Times magazine leading up to the awards.
“Human kindness, reassurance and sympathy are age-old qualities, yet they are as important today as they have ever been.”
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