DD was very grateful that one of her medical school peers had taken Art A level and so could sort out the presentations they needed for a major group project.
I personally think that breadth is a good thing in an increasingly uncertain world. DD took five A levels (electronics and physics as extras - the first like art was useful because it was hands on and practical) as well as high level sport (National championships as well as regional and county representation), had a school leadership position, and spent part of her gap year interning in a cookery school.
She loves medicine and is good at it. But she is one of the over 50% of doctors finishing her second foundation year who is unemployed in a week's time. (Blame Boris for relaxing the Resident Market Labour Test which means that doctors already in the UK are having to compete with applicants from all over the world for entry level jobs, and inevitably some can offer the experience that doctors starting out don't have. Elsewhere, like Australia, overseas applicants are only eligible for jobs that cannot be filled locally.)
Those extra two A levels may yet come into play. They allowed her to spend an intercalation year studying engineering at Imperial. This week she is busy signing up with NHS Bank and hope there is enough zero hours work to cover her mortgage (she had really wanted to pursue her career in a traditionally hard to recruit area), living costs, petrol, and professional indemnity insurance.
(She is lucky in that a consultant she vaguely knew and who she bumped into in a corridor has said he can offer her as many shifts as she wants. Budget for short term locum work is being cut and because of the over supply of unemployed doctors, hourly rates are falling. Others in her position will have to supplement a handful of shifts each month with other zero hours work outside medicine.)
In parallel she is applying to Australia and has an interview next week. Five A levels on her CV will have done her no harm as is demonstrates that she can handle a busy workload.
Many UK educated doctors in Australia, are finding themselves stuck in entry level jobs. Australia prioritises Australian residents for speciality training, so access can be limited until you get Australian residency. At the same time the huge international competition for entry level jobs in the UK and the growing pool of unemployed doctors means that it is hard to find a job back home.
If Australia or the likely career plateau do not suit, DD will switch careers to engineering. She is told that an Imperial degree and a good background in hands on medicine will be an attractive offer.
In short medicine is not the secure career people assume it is, and the wider the skill set you have, the better. Some background in art would lend itself to medical publishing, the creation of educational resources, or marketing. Four A levels demonstrates you can handle a heavier workload and that you have interests beyond a narrow medical focus. The NHS is a monopsonistic employer and much of the decision making seems either short term or political. As much as a young person might want to work in public medicine, there is no guarantee that the NHS wants them.
The BMA seems to have belatedly caught onto unemployment as an issue. It was only a few months ago that a committee seeking more priority for UK resident doctors when training places are allocated (over 50% of places this year went to doctors who graduated from overseas medical schools) were labelled racist and told to apologise.
www.bma.org.uk/bma-media-centre/bma-seeks-deal-on-doctor-unemployment-as-survey-reveals-half-of-resident-doctors-finishing-foundation-training-have-no-job-to-go-to-next-month