Seven charities have dropped the Duchess of York as a patron or ambassador after an email from 2011 revealed that she called sex offender Jeffrey Epstein her supreme friend and seemed to apologise for her public criticism of him.
Julia's House, a children's hospice, was the first to remove Sarah Ferguson, Prince Andrew's ex-wife, saying it was inappropriate for her to continue in the role.
The Teenage Cancer Trust, Natasha Allergy Research Foundation, Children's Literacy Charity, National Foundation for Retired Service Animals and Prevent Breast Cancer also announced they had dropped the duchess as patron.
The British Heart Foundation said she would no longer be its ambassador.
A spokesperson for the duchess said she was not commenting on the charities' decisions to end their links with her.
It comes after the Mail on Sunday and Sun newspapers published a 2011 email from the duchess to Epstein, which appears to have been sent after she had publicly claimed to have broken off contact with him.
In the email, she appeared to privately apologise for her public rejection of Epstein, saying: You have always been a steadfast, generous and supreme friend to me and my family.
That seemed to contradict her public denunciation of Epstein in an interview from a few weeks earlier, in which she had said her involvement with him, including borrowing money, had been a gigantic error of judgement and that: What he did was wrong and for which he was rightly jailed.
The duchess had said she would have nothing ever to do with Jeffrey Epstein ever again only for the later email to say she humbly apologised to him and know you feel hellaciously let down by me.
A spokesperson for the duchess said her subsequent email to Epstein, describing him as a friend, was written to counter a threat from him to sue her for defamation - and that she still really regretted any association with him.
This email was sent in the context of advice the duchess was given to try to assuage Epstein and his threats, said a statement from her spokesman, when the email to Epstein had been published at the weekend.
In light of the email's release, charities such as the Teenage Cancer Trust, where she had been patron for 35 years, have cut their ties with her. The Natasha Allergy Research Foundation has also ended its connection with the duchess, who had been patron since it was founded in 2019.
Sarah Ferguson's former husband, the Duke of York, has also faced scrutiny over his connections with Epstein, which has led to his stepping back from royal duties.
This situation has tarnished the duchess's public image, especially as most of her remaining profile pertains to charity work with vulnerable causes.
Future observations on Prince Andrew's and Sarah Ferguson's connections to Epstein will likely come to light as further documents are released.
