By Dan Christensen
FloridaBulldog.org
Since the 1970s mobster Tommy Farese has been a recurring character on the pages of South Florida newspapers. So it was surprising when the reputed Colombo family consiglieri didn’t make the Sun-Sentinel last week for his latest alleged caper: a $93-million health care
By Dan Christensen
FloridaBulldog.org
Three years ago, state healthcare regulators moved to block Dr. Jack Michel’s bid to buy the Hollywood nursing home where more than a dozen elderly patients later met their deaths in the wake of Hurricane Irma. But months later, after Michel retained a
By Fred Schulte, Center for Public Integrity
Department of Health and Human Services headquarters in Wshington Photo: Jasmine Norwood/Center for Public Integrity
Citing massive budget and staff cuts, federal officials are set to scale back or drop a host of investigations into Medicare and Medicaid fraud and abuse — even though cracking down on government waste and cutting health care costs have been top priorities for the Obama administration.
The Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General is set to lose a total of 400 staffers that are deployed nationwide as a primary defense against health care fraud and abuse. Though agency officials have yet to decide which investigations will be shelved as staff dwindles, the existing staff is already stretched so thin that the agency has failed to act on 1,200 complaints over the past year alleging wrongdoing — and expects that number to rise.