Medicine: 70 per cent of places are reserved for the screening semester

It’s time to fact-check the figures on the 27,001 new places for Medicine and the increase of almost 3,000 places recorded over the course of 12 months. This is also because all sorts of things have been said in recent days. For example, that one in two of the 52,300 students enrolled in the ‘filter’ semester might manage to gain admission, or that the majority of the additional places were at private universities. In reality, an analysis of the tables attached to the Ministerial Decree signed on Thursday 6th by Minister Anna Maria Bernini, and a comparison with the corresponding measure for 2025/26, reveals a different picture.

The first key point is that the number of places reserved for the 2026/27 academic year remains essentially stable compared with last year, at around 70 per cent. It is worth noting that, once again, only state universities will offer open admission, with the selection process postponed until the start of the second semester, based on a national ranking drawn up from the results of the three national exams in biology, chemistry and physics scheduled for 10 December and 11 January. In contrast, private universities and English-language degree programmes will continue to use entrance exams.

Turning to the figures, of the 27,001 places available, 18,830 are reserved for the ‘filter’ semester (69.7 per cent); in 2025/26, there were 17,278 out of a total of 24,026 (71.9 per cent). On paper, the decrease was around 2 per cent, but as enrolments have fallen slightly (from 54,300 to 52,300) and the number of available places has increased in the meantime, the theoretical ratio of aspiring medical students to actual places available has risen from 31.8 per cent to 36 per cent. So from less than a third of candidates to more than one in three. Assuming, of course, that all prospective students actually start attending the courses scheduled from 1 September and then sit the exams in the three core subjects. But we will only find that out after the summer.

Another point that emerges from the data (see the chart above) is that the real surge (+54.6 per cent) in places is in English-taught Medicine programmes, to the extent that, within a year, the number rose from 2,452 to 3,792. The increase was more pronounced at private universities (from 820 to 1,500, an 82 per cent rise) than at public universities, where places rose from 1,632 to 2,292 (+40 per cent). These places will be allocated via a standardised entrance exam for all applicants, known as the IMAT, scheduled for 29 September in Italia and abroad (see separate article on this page).

By contrast, the increase in places offered by non-state institutions through their entrance exams (which, incidentally, have already taken place almost everywhere) is significantly more modest. Here, the number of places has risen from 4,296 in 2025/26 to 4,320 in 2026/27, representing an increase of around 0.6 per cent compared with a year ago.