Topic: Medicare
With all the political hyperbole about saving services in Washington, one area that deserves attention is the elimination of Medicare fraud, estimated to cost us $60 billion per year. Several years ago my dear mother-in-law went to be with her Lord Jesus and family members. Her transitioning was painful for us, we loved her dearly. I was shocked months later to learn that her estate was being taped for the Medicare co-pay and deductible for a procedure that she had NEVER had. When I challenged the provider, there was a quick reply that ‘It was a billing error and it would be corrected immediately.’
Was it a billing error or was it an attempt to defraud the government and her estate at a weak moment. I filled a complaint for the suspected fraud with Medicare.
Peter Roskam is working to reintroduce the Fighting Fraud and Abuse to Save Taxpayer Dollars Act (FAST Act); a bill to strengthen Medicare by moving to a fraud prevention system modeled after credit card industry fraud-prevention tactics.
Medicare is already going to take steeper-than-expected cuts in 2014 thanks to ObamaCare so we need to make sure that every bit of funding for this vital safety net is safe from fraud, waste and abuse.
Our government needs to work to stop criminals from stealing from our seniors. Thank you Peter Roskam for working to this end!
Ronald H. Jaeger

Ted,

May I kindly suggest that you and your fellow Patch editors consider closing comments on the article, http://stcharles-il.patch.com/articles/how-much-will-falling-off-the-fiscal-cliff-cost-you.

Alternatively, please let me know if there's a way that I can hide it from the St Charles Patch homepage. There are local conversations that I want to monitor but the recent comments stream is absolutely cluttered with that flame war.

Thanks,
Brian Doyle