When fame and medical privacy clash: Kate and other crises of confidentiality

The Princess of Wales is the latest person in the public eye to find there are questions about the security of their health history

Medical records are meant to be sacred, the preserve of the dedicated professionals treating a patient, but the Princess of Wales is not the first to find herself at the centre of allegations that they have been plundered for gossip.

The former prime minister Gordon Brown told the Leveson inquiry into media conduct that he believed a story in the Sun about his son Fraser's diagnosis with cystic fibrosis in 2006 could only have come from leaked medical records.