Queen Mathilde celebrates her 50th birthday today. No special events or celebrations are planned to mark the Queen of the Belgians’ birthday. Instead Queen Mathilde has chosen to use her 50th birthday to highlight issues related to mental well-being. She did this with a series of walks and bicycle rides with individuals and organisation that are concerned with mental well-being issues in Brussels and Belgium’s 10 provinces. The walks and cycle rides took place between June and December last year.
To mark her 50th birthday Queen Mathilde launched an initiative entitled “Moving together for mental well-being”. The initiative got under way on 13 July last year in West Flanders, where she went on a bicycle ride with blind and visually impaired people, people living with other handicaps or with conditions or in situations that make them vulnerable. A further 10 such activities were organised, one each in Belgium’s other 9 provinces and in our country’s capital Brussels.
Mental well-being has long been an issue that is close to Queen Mathilde’s heart.
Queen Mathilde said in the past that "I want to use the occasion of my 50th birthday to stress just how important it is to take care of your mental well-being. Because is there anyone that isn’t vulnerable?”.
A special coin worth 12.50 euro has been struck to mark the Queen’s birthday and the Belgian post office Bpost has issued a commemorative stamp.
On Friday evening the commercial broadcasters RTL and VTM will broadcast a rare interview with the Queen of the Belgians in which she will talk about her life and how it has changed since she married the then Prince Filip in 1999.