Does Prince Andrew sweat or is he obviously lying?

Netflix’s Scoop revisits the most excruciatingly embarrassing moment in recent Royal history. In 2019 Prince Andrew was dealing with a PR nightmare due to his close links to international paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. How best to stop the gossip and explain his side of the story. A tell-all interview on BBC’s Newsnight should do the trick!

You don’t need me to tell you that this exercise in damage control was equivalent to putting out a fire with an extinguisher full of propane. Andrew’s ludicrous defense of his actions didn’t convince anybody and he came across as deeply stupid, conceited, and borderline delusional.

One of the most eyebrow-raising moments came when Andrew argued against Virginia Giuffre’s allegations against him by claiming he has a “peculiar medical condition” that means he can’t sweat. Guiffre had described him as “profusely sweating” during their encounter, to which Andrew responded by saying:

“I didn’t sweat at the time because I had suffered what I would describe as an overdose of adrenaline in the Falklands War when I was shot at, and I simply — it was almost impossible for me to sweat. And it’s only because I have done a number of things in the recent past that I am starting to be able to do that again. So I’m afraid to say that there’s a medical condition that says that I didn’t do it.”

Riiiiight. So our boy Andrew was just so darn brave as a soldier it was “impossible” for him to sweat for an indeterminate period of time. But having done “a number of things” he can now sweat once more. It’s a tall tale, but is it even a remotely plausible?

A profoundly sweaty man

First up, nobody can deny that Andrew doesn’t look like an innately sweaty person – he just has that moist kinda vibe to him. Thankfully we don’t have to rely on vibes, as professionals have their opinions. In a 2019 interview with the National Post Dr. Mark Lupin, a clinical instructor dermatologist, gave his opinion:

“It is implausible to the point of being impossible that an ‘overdose of adrenaline’ could cause a persistent inability to sweat; there are no human studies nor is there reasonable science to back up this claim. The claim that an overdose of adrenaline has led to the inability to sweat does not make sense.”

Lupin continued, explaining that damage to the sweating system would have to have injured the autonomic nervous system, which would have caused “grave and permanent neurological damage”. He also points out that high levels of adrenaline are in fact associated with increased sweatiness, meaning his apparent battle experience should have left him much more sweaty than the average Prince.

It’s notable that in 2021 Giuffre’s lawyers asked him to provide some evidence that he was ever unable to sweat:

“If Prince Andrew truly has no documents concerning his communications with Maxwell or Epstein, his travel to Florida, New York, or various locations in London, his alleged medical inability to sweat, or anything that would support the alibis he gave during his BBC interview, then continuing with discovery will not be burdensome to him at all.”

Andrew never did provide any proof, though he settled out of court for a large sum and the case never went to trial.

So what should we conclude here? Well, first up we know that Andrew is, shall we say, not the sharpest knife in the Royal cutlery set. He overestimates his abilities, has little experience of being called out when he’s talking rubbish, and seems to regard most people as beneath him.

Based on that, combined with the medical opinion that his claim is vanishingly unlikely, we’re going to chalk this up to him lying through his teeth and figuring he’d get away with it. Sadly, given that Andrew remains a public-facing member of the Royal family and continues to smugly live in a state of unbelievable luxury and opulence without any real consequences for his horrific acts, he has gotten away with it.

It seems the closest we’ll get to justice is Virginia Giuffre getting a huge payout, and as she has to live with the traumatic memories of being pressed against Andrew’s sweaty body, we’d say she deserves every single penny.