Healthcare Risk Management Quotes Paul Werner on New DOJ Whistleblower Program

Buttaci, Leardi & Werner member Paul D. Werner was quoted by Healthcare Risk Management in an article titled “New DOJ Whistleblower Program Greatly Increases Risk.” The article, featured in the October 2024 issue of the publication, discusses the Department of Justice’s new whistleblower program that focuses on healthcare.

The program, which is intended to uncover and prosecute corporate crime, offers whistleblowers a reward up to $50 million. The information related by the whistleblower must pertain to one of four specified categories, including healthcare fraud schemes involving private insurance plans.

Werner told Healthcare Risk Management that the program could have the unintended effect of scaring some providers away from working with private insurers.

“A lot of people have stayed away from federal dollars specifically because they couldn’t stomach the risk of something like that happening, especially in an environment that we see now where there is government-sanctioned bounty hunting with companies that exist solely for the purpose of surreptitiously sneaking around and finding claims that they can try to file under the False Claims Act,” he said. “Now there is this extra layer of liability even for those who have taken steps to affirmatively try to insulate themselves from that. The biggest concern is, what kind of chilling effect does this have on a provider’s willingness to engage with insurance companies at all?”

The full article can be read at Healthcare Risk Management.

• Posted on: Oct 7 2024