"Medicare still pays out $12.6 billion a year in improper payments ? we have to stop throwing away money like Monopoly dollars when we're handling the earnings of Americans paying into the system," Grassley said. "We need vigilance and oversight like this to protect the nation's disabled and elderly and go after the those who take advantage of the system."
Grassley, who chairs the Senate Special Committee on Aging, offers additional help for citizens who need a safe haven to report Medicare fraud, waste or abuse. Instructions, including a confidential form, can be found at http://aging.senate.gov or by writing:
Iowa's senior senator has been an effective watchdog fighting fraud against the taxpayer. Fourteen years ago, Grassley authored an update of the False Claims Act. Since then, Grassley's whistleblower provisions have recovered more than $3 billion in tax dollars that otherwise would have been lost to fraud.
While Grassley launched the effort in response to the fraud by defense contractors in the last decade, during the 1990's his qui tam provisions emerged as the government's most effective tool against health care fraud. The provisions allow private citizens who expose fraud to sue companies on the government's behalf and entitles the government to recover three times its losses.