Nationwide health care fraud exposed
The Departments of Justice and Health and Human Services recently announced “the largest health care fraud enforcement action by the Medicare Fraud Strike Force.”
The investigation led to charges against 412 people — including 115 doctors, nurses and other health workers — over $1.3 billion in false billings.
“Of those charged, over 120 defendants, including doctors, were charged for their roles in prescribing and distributing opioids and other dangerous narcotics,” reads a Justice Department news release.
“Thirty state Medicaid Fraud Control Units also participated in (the) arrests. In addition, HHS has initiated suspension actions against 295 providers, including doctors, nurses and pharmacists.”
In Louisiana, Attorney General Jeff Landry said in a news release, the state’s “Medicaid Fraud Control Unit has arrested 19 and obtained a grand jury indictment against two individuals and their company” as part of the nationwide initiative.
The federal news release said that the enforcement actions “aggressively target schemes in billing Medicare, Medicaid, and TRICARE (a health insurance program for members and veterans of the armed forces and their families) for medically unnecessary prescription drugs and compounded medications that often were never even purchased and/or distributed to beneficiaries.
“The charges also involve individuals contributing to the opioid epidemic, with particular focus on medical professionals involved in the unlawful distribution of opioids and other prescription narcotics, a particular focus for Department.”
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the news release says, “approximately 91 Americans die every day of an opioid related overdose.”
The DOJ and HHS are to be congratulated for this crackdown on abuses in the national health care system. But it also shows the need for greater anti-fraud measures throughout the health care system.