HHS Secretary Sebelius and Attorney General Holder Announce Healthcare Fraud Prevention Summit

Attorney General Eric Holder and Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius have announced a National Summit on Healthcare Fraud to be held at the Natcher Conference Center at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, MD. This is the latest initiative of the Health Care Fraud Prevention and Enforcement Action Team (HEAT), to combat Medicare fraud.

Attorney General Holder remarked on the need for the HEAT task force at its creation in May of ’09, “Every year we lose tens of billions of dollars in Medicare and Medicaid funds to fraud.  Those billions represent health care dollars that could be spent on medicine, elder care or emergency room visits, but instead are wasted on greed.  This is unacceptable, and the Justice Department is committed to working with the Department of Health and Human Services to eradicate it.”  Secretary Sebelius added that it was time to “turn up the heat” on Medicare abusers.

The HEAT team includes senior officials from DOJ and HHS and aims to strengthen existing anti-fraud initiatives while also investing new resources and technology to prevent fraud, waste and abuse.  Past efforts have included the expansion of joint DOJ-HHS Medicare Fraud Strike Force teams that have been successfully fighting fraud in South Florida and Los Angeles since 2007.  The Medicare Fraud Strike Force team operating in South Florida has convicted 146 defendants and secured $186 million in criminal fines and civil recoveries as of May 2009.  After the success of operations in South Florida, the Medicare Fraud Strike Force expanded in May 2008 to phase two in Los Angeles, where 37 defendants have been charged with criminal health care fraud offenses.  To date in the Los Angeles cases, more than $55 million has been ordered in restitution to the Medicare program.  The HEAT strike force has since expanded its operations into Detroit and Houston as well.

Fighting “waste, fraud and abuse” has been a cornerstone of President Obama’s promise to reduce healthcare costs and return the Medicare program to solvency.

For more information on the event, click here.