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Amerigroup will pay $225 million to settle allegations by union and Illinois state regime that Amerigroup's health plans denied coverage to fraught women and people with health ailments in the Illinois Medicaid program, the insurer and the U.S. Department of Justice said on Thursday, Reuters reports (Dixon et al., Reuters, 8/14).
Cleveland Tyson, a other vice president of political science relations at Amerigroup's Illinois subsidiary, in 2002 filed a whistle blower lawsuit that claimed the company cherry-picked the healthiest patients to reduce disbursal. In March 2007, a federal pass judgment in Chicago ruled against Amerigroup and awarded $334 million in the lawsuit.
Amerigroup, which first-class honours degree announced the proposed $225 million settlement agreement in July, said that it also volition pay $9 million in legal fees in the settlement, and the party has agreed to recruit into a corporate unity agreement as part of the resolution (Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, 7/23). DOJ as well said that the insurer's appeal of the $334 million courtyard judgment will be fired as part of the settlement.
Amerigroup last month announced a second-quarter loss of $162.5 million on a one-time, after-tax charge of $199 million for the settlement and aforementioned that it will pay for the settlement from an already established fund.
In a financial statement, Patrick Fitzgerald, the U.S. attorney for the northern district of Illinois, aforementioned, "A settlement of this magnitude sends the clear message that this bureau takes health care shammer very seriously," adding, "This case likewise illustrated the perils a defendant faces in pickings a
