Uh, spoiler alert. Just been to see Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, all about T Rex, velociraptors et al, right? Wrong. While it is biting and incisive, the weaponry here is not tooth and claw but cutting satire and metaphor. Because Jurassic World is all about general practice, yeah?
If you’ve seen the film and the penny hadn’t dropped, let me explain. The dinosaurs (general practice) are about to be destroyed by suffocating volcanic ash (CQC, revalidation) and lava (creeping workload).
An arrangement is made for the dinosaurs to be rescued by head of Dinosaur Protection Group, Claire (a dead ringer for Helen Stokes-Lampard) and dino-expert Owen (a dead ringer for Richard Vautrey) by an apparently benign and powerful suit, Mills (a dead ringer for Jeremy Hunt, and this time I really mean it) brokering some shiny vision of the future (the Forward View).
What could go wrong? Quite a lot. Turns out that Mills/Hunt is actually planning to, get this, privatise those dinosaurs/general practice by selling them off to the highest bidder, leaving Claire/Stokes-Lampard and Owen/Vautrey to battle for the dinosaurs’, and their own, survival.
We GPs will actually rise up to rule the medical world again
In the end (uber-spoiler alert), there’s a massive fight resulting in the dinosaurs/general practice escaping to the forest (to form federations), Mills/Hunt being ripped apart by two slavering carnivores (you reap what you sow) and Claire/Stokes-Lampard and Owen/Vautrey getting it together (frankly weird).
The moral of this brilliant allegorical piece is that, when the dust has settled, our GP kingdom may appear to have fallen, but we GPs will actually rise up to rule the medical world again. I am dinosaur, hear me roar!
The only downside is that the subtleties employed in the Jurassic World metaphor may be lost on the general public. I tried to explain it all to a dead-eyed, slack jawed, popcorn munching child sat next to me and his father threatened to call the police.
Dr Tony Copperfield is a jobbing GP in Essex
