WASHINGTON — One year ago today, just days after the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs released a majority staff report finding that the Medicaid program is “plagued by waste, fraud and abuse,” the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) unveiled several initiatives to combat Medicaid fraud. Continuing his oversight to root out waste, fraud and abuse in Medicaid, U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), the chairman of the committee, today sent a letter to CMS Administrator Seema Verma seeking to determine the effectiveness of these efforts to “improve Medicaid program integrity through greater transparency and accountability, strengthened data, and innovative and robust analytic tools.”
“With Medicaid spending now projected to rise at an average annual rate of 5.7 percent over the next decade, significantly faster than U.S. gross domestic product, it is imperative that CMS utilize every tool at its disposal to minimize waste, fraud, and abuse,” Sen. Johnson wrote to Administrator Verma. “Accordingly, I write to respectfully request an update on those June 2018 initiatives.”
Senator Johnson’s letter to Administrator Verma can be found here.