Taxpayers footed duplicate payments for hundreds of thousands of Medicaid patients across the United States in recent years, totaling up to at least $4.3 billion in waste, according to a Wall Street Journal investigation published on Wednesday. Some of the largest insurance companies in the country — such as Centene, Elevance Health, and UnitedHealth Group …
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Taxpayers footed duplicate payments for hundreds of thousands of Medicaid patients across the United States in recent years, totaling up to at least $4.3 billion in waste, according to a Wall Street Journal investigation published on Wednesday.
Some of the largest insurance companies in the country — such as Centene, Elevance Health, and UnitedHealth Group — received hundreds of millions of dollars each in duplicate Medicaid payments, the WSJ reported. The duplicate payments occurred after Medicaid beneficiaries moved and began receiving coverage in their new home state without being disenrolled in their previous state. Between 2019 and 2021, states, which are primarily responsible for Medicaid, made duplicate payments for around 660,000 patients each year.
