Hundreds of people, including friends, family and politicians gathered in Melbourne to remember the impact of Katie Allen’s life as a doctor, medical researcher, parliamentarian and proud mum.
On Thursday, a funeral was held at St Paul’s Cathedral for Allen, who died in December 2025, two years after being diagnosed with cholangiocarcinoma, a rare and aggressive cancer of the bile ducts.
The packed service saw a line snaking out of the cathedral to honour a woman described as fiercely loyal, compassionate, hard-working and someone who positively impacted the lives of many.
Allen’s public service extended from the clinic, community and research laboratory to the Australian Parliament as a former Liberal MP.
She was a leading paediatric allergist, whose research reshaped the understanding, prevention and treatment of childhood food allergy. Her scientific career was built at Murdoch Children’s Research Institute and The Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne, where she was the institute’s first director of the Population Health theme.
Speaking at Allen’s funeral service, Professor Kathryn North, director of the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, shared that Allen was a woman “always seeking answers”, but who was never too busy to give her attention and support to those around her. North also honoured Allen’s work ethic, speaking about how she was raising young children while completing a PhD and producing research that reshaped global understanding of food allergies.
“When I think of Katie I think of light, of sparkle and colour. Her warm dazzling smile and that cheeky grin when she knew she was pushing you that little bit too much,” said Professor North.
“Her bright pink lipstick … her passion for what was right. Katie was idealistic, driven and honest to a fault.”
Allen is survived by her husband, Malcolm, and their four children Monty, Jemima, Arabella and Archie. The family spoke lovingly of Allen at the funeral, with Malcom describing the moment he met the love of his life and was struck by her “flame of energy”, intellect and ambition.
Malcolm said Allen was relentless when pursuing a cause she believed in and would sometimes “exhaust us, frustrate us, and then astonish us”.
Speaking to Allen’s sense of inspiring character, her son Archie added that her empathy always seemed to come before judgement, particularly in politics.
Allen’s daughter, Arabella described her mum as a “force of nature”, whose greatest gift to the world was that she cared.
“If there’s anyone that doesn’t believe in the word impossible, it was Mum”.