The National University of Singapore's (NUS) medical degree course is the most competitive course to get into. It is also the most expensive - charging almost $29,000 in tuition fees a year. So one would expect a large number of students entering the school to come from fairly affluent families who can afford to pay the high fees.

But figures from the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine show that almost one in five of its students comes from homes with a monthly per capita income of $1,900, which qualifies them for financial aid from the school. The figure is higher than the 16.8 per cent of undergraduates universitywide at NUS who received financial aid for the academic year of 2017.