Brisbane biomed engineer here. I did really well in my undergrad, and did a PhD in tissue engineering / biomaterials straight after.

Struggled for 10 months to find a job. No mechanical or similar graduate positions would hire me, even though my undergrad degree overlapped with mechanical to a large degree (80+ percent) and I knew from experience that after my PhD I had the ability to master new skills extremely quickly and would have easily performed well in any slightly related major - outperforming graduates for sure.

Particularly in Australia, where biotech is a very small sector, bme jobs are sparse, poorly paid, and highly competitive. I feel like if I had studied mechanical and done the same PhD I would actually be more employable now for generic jobs.

Perhaps I would have had a slightly harder time at the start of my PhD work but my biology and chemistry skills were still very lacking going in despite being a bme.