Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is attempting to combat Medicaid fraud, and it appears that the database would be a good start (“Monitoring Medicaid,” Editorial, Sept. 16).
However what is more alarming is that a list of licensed home health-care providers doesn’t already exist within the State Education Department or the Health Department.
How did Cuomo come across this scam? Was it from an anonymous tip, or did some of the investigators from the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit within the AG’s office figure it out?
Or maybe it was someone from the New York State Medicaid Inspector General’s office?
Either way, our state has more than enough resources to combat Medicaid fraud. Why does it continue to be a problem?
Jennifer Forte
Millwood
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While it is encouraging to see Cuomo going after Medicaid fraud, surely it is too little, too late when fraud is so pervasive in the entire program.
What are legislators and those who administer Medicaid in New York doing about $18 billion a year in fraud?
Those who want government to control all medical care are always lecturing us about the efficiency and low overhead of Medicare and Medicaid.
Excluded from the calculation of overhead are such details as forcing the cost of contending with 130,000 pages of regulations onto providers, and the cost of more than 100,000 IRS employees to collect the taxes that pay for them.
Efficiency is easy when those who administer the programs don’t care about cost or fraud.
Richard E. Ralston
Newport Beach, Calif.