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William Lajanes reports from Los Angeles on hospice fraud, describing it as costing taxpayers 200 million dollars a year, with the worst activity seen in LA. He cites ghost patients, sham companies, corrupt doctors, and hospitals billing for care never provided, including owners stealing Medicare numbers from seniors who don’t know they’re on hospice until they need real care and then can’t receive it because the hospice owns their Medicare number. He and others call it human trafficking of beneficiaries.
A source labels hospice fraud in LA as “crazy,” noting hospice care has grown sevenfold in the last five years. They estimate about 3.5 billion dollars of fraud in LA County alone. They describe LA as ground zero for scammers. Sheila Clark states hundreds of LA hospices falsely bill the government for unnecessary care, often cycling patients from one provider to another.
Another participant describes a “non ending benefit,” with patients allegedly receiving four thousand dollars a month indefinitely. Patients are said to be bought and sold like trading cards, and recruiters told to post at busy shopping centers or senior living addresses to knock on doors, offering walkers, wheelchairs, and promising recruiters earn 300 dollars for any senior aged 62 they sign up, sick or not. That patient data and Medicare numbers are then sold to providers.
A speaker emphasizes that a Medicare MIB number is highly lucrative. When asked how much federal taxpayers are losing, the response is “Millions, billions.”
The report asserts that Russian Armenian gangs and the mafia are leading many of these efforts, allegedly able to corrupt and work with doctors willing to lie. A doctor is cited who billed the government 120,000,000 dollars in a single year, claiming to oversee 1,900 patients. With almost 2,000 hospice agencies, LA County has more than 36 states combined, and 30 times more than Florida or New York. It is stated that 18 percent of the entire country’s home health care billing comes from Los Angeles County. A map shows a cluster of 287 hospice providers in a two-mile radius, including locations in strip malls, unmarked buildings, a wrecking yard, and a vacant lot.
The problem is described as once a beneficiary’s number is assigned to a hospice, that patient cannot get care elsewhere, including in a hospital. There is a call to listen to people who say they’ve been scammed.
Context is provided that Governor Newsom filed a civil rights complaint against Doctor Oz for unfairly targeting the Armenian community; auditors and prosecutors say Armenian organized crime is involved with Medicare fraud. California auditors four years ago warned that lax state controls created the mess, prompting a moratorium on new hospices and the revocation of about 280 licenses since then. Ayesha?