Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times,
Dr. Mehmet Oz, the administrator of the agency overseeing Medicaid and Medicare, announced Tuesday that his agency’s anti-fraud effort will come to every state.
During an interview at a Politico-hosted event, Oz said that every U.S. state can expect anti-fraud activities involving funds received through the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid (CMS).
“We are going to announce this week that all 50 states are going to be requested to give us a plan over the next 30 days of how they’re going to re-validate providers in high-risk areas in their states,”Oz said.
Oz explained that it would involve proving whether individuals who are enrolled in CMS programs “really exist” or not, and whether the states “have a right to provide these services.”
“We’re asking the states to own that problem ... red and blue, all of them,”he said, responding to a question from the Politico moderator about whether it involves every state.
He later added that if states “don’t take it seriously, it indicates to us that we might have to take the audits ... more aggressively.”
When asked about a possible deadline, he said CMS is asking the states to provide the agency with a plan over the next month.
Oz, a medical doctor better known as the moniker Dr. Oz from when he was a television personality, oversees the nation’s largest health insurance programs as the administrator of CMS. To date, Oz has sent letters to California, Florida, Maine, and New York alleging fraud in the states’ Medicaid programs.
At the Tuesday event, the Politico interviewer mentioned CMS having issued a statement earlier this month to correct a comment made by Oz on social media that 5.1 million beneficiaries received personal care services, which include things like help with eating, bathing, and dressing.
Source: ZeroHedge News
