Coronavirus: Pent-up Ruby rage unleashed on official

Epidemiologist Kelly-Anne Ressler was in tears at the special commission of inquiry, conceding that strict protocols weren’t followed closely enough.

For several hours, commissioner Bret Walker SC had been restraining himself.

Perched on the witness stand was Kelly-Anne Ressler, an epidemiologist with NSW Health and the first departmental witness to give evidence before his special commission of inquiry.

All morning a demure Ms Ressler, an expert in disease surveillance, had stammered through questions, trying to be helpful.

She was being asked to help untangle a series of decisions in the days prior to the Ruby Princess’ arrival, many of which she did not make. “I wasn’t part of the decision-making for developing the testing criteria,” she said, “and until you raised it with me now I wasn’t aware that it was so unsatisfactory.”

Epidemiologist Kelly-Anne Ressler gives evidence at the Ruby Princess Inquiry. Picture: Supplied

This went on for most of the morning: she was not on the four-person panel that graded the ship a “low risk” for entry to Australia; she did not write the inch-thick guidelines governing cruise ship arrivals; and she was not a medical doctor qualified to give clinical advice.

Yet somehow she wound up wearing the mistakes of an entire department. Mr Walker, normally avuncular and affable, became impatient and barbed, his questions sharpening to a withering cross-examination.

The Ruby Princess leaves Port Kembla in Wollongong. Picture; AAP.

“Are you sure about that last sentence?” he snapped, when Ms Ressler suggested there was nothing she could have done to stop cruise ships abiding by their pre-arrival protocols. “Actually you could find out whether they were following Australian protocols, couldn’t you? That’s simply incorrect for you to tell me on oath a minute ago that all you could do was ensure they complied with their own protocols. I’m very concerned that you may have tried to mislead with that answer.”

“It was not my intention,” Ms Ressler said softly.

Within minutes she had become a bulwark for pent-up critique, absorbing what should have been aimed at higher-ups central to decision-making, who are yet to be scheduled to give evidence.

Despite assurances from Mr Walker that the inquiry was a fact-finding mission, not a blame-apportioning one, Ms Ressler would end up apologising for a litany of errors committed by other people. “Has there been to your knowledge up to this moment any step taken within (NSW) Health to reflect on that unsatisfactory state of affairs?” Mr Walker asked.

“Not that I know of,” she said.