The rise between 2002 and 2006 was an average 2.4 per cent a year.

In releasing the figures on Monday, Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan attributed the 'higher than normal' increase to the jump in medical fees and prices of Chinese medicine.

He was responding to Mr Sam Tan, MP for Tanjong Pagar GRC, who asked why health-care costs had shot up and what aid poor Singaporeans would receive.

Replying, Mr Khaw explained that the health-care inflation rate was measured by the price changes of a basket of items and the cost of three, in particular, had soared.

They were: fees in public and private hospitals; outpatient specialist fees in public hospitals; and the cost of Chinese herbs and treatment from a Chinese physician.

For instance, traditional Chinese medicine cost 33 per cent more last year than in 2005.

The minister traced the various increases to these factors: higher oil prices causing imports to cost more; the rise in wages of health-care workers; and the Goods and Services Tax going up from 5 per cent to 7 per cent in last July.

These were also the factors that fuelled Singapore's inflation rate, which hit 4.2 per cent in November and could cross the 5 per cent mark this month .

The fast-rising cost of living was also noted earlier in the House by Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam.

Five MPs, including Madam Halimah Yacob, MP for Jurong GRC, raised questions on, among others, the plight of the low-income as prices rise for necessities like housing.

The Finance Minister assured Singaporeans the Government would continue with its 'targeted and efficient' help schemes, such as Workfare for needy older workers.

Read the full story in Tuesday's edition of The Straits Times.