COLUMBUS, Ohio (WSYX) — Ohio’s in the spotlight, as a federal task force looks into Medicaid waiver fraud in the state, specifically involving the Bhutanese community.
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The Committee on Oversight Task Force held its first hearing on Ohio Medicaid waiver fraud on June 3. Chairman Brandon Gill (R) said taxpayers have lost $1.2 billion to “foreign fraudsters.”
“Recent reporting shows that some of, that many of the Somali and Bhutanese communities commit a large portion, if not the majority, of home health Medicaid fraud in Ohio,” Gill said.
“It sort of petrified me, because we are a persecuted minority in my own generation,” said Sudarshan Pyakurel. “I’ve lived persecution in Bhutan, and when the whole community was labeled that way, I feel like we are being again persecuted.”
Chairman Gill said in many cases, family members bill Medicaid for alleged services provided to their own relatives. He claims fraudulent home health businesses steal “massive” amounts of money.
“Many of them operate out of largely abandoned, often windowless buildings, like the one at 6161 Bush Boulevard, which is home to 94 different companies that have recently billed Medicaid $66 million,” Gill said.
But, immigrants from Bhutan said those claims do not reflect their entire community and are harmful.
“It’s a hard-working community,” said Pyakurel. “A majority of people work in the warehouse and industries, and it’s one of the highly sought-after working populations in central Ohio.”
They said they are feeling an impact from the comments made this week and so are their children.
“It’s so scary to him to walk to his soccer field,” said Tika Adhikari. “So he’s like, Mom, can you drive me to the soccer field? We just like 10 minutes walk from home. That type of situation that our children are facing. Not just us, it’s our young children facing that kind of public scrutiny.”
They stress they do not condone illegal activity and support fair investigations of allegations of Medicaid fraud and misuse of taxpayer funds. But, they are calling on lawmakers to stop what they consider generalizing the entire Bhutanese community.
“I am also one of the product of the political ethnic cleansing in my own country,” said Adhikari. “So, seeing that in my childhood and growing up in another country and coming over here and again hearing this sentiment like you are criminals, you are bad, it’s just unfathomable. It’s just unbelievable that people are targeting us for no reason. We haven’t done anything.”
On June 4, Governor Mike DeWine announced that the Ohio Department of Medicaid suspended payments to 49 Medicaid home health providers that have potential red flags. The department reportedly found concerning billing patterns, and those providers are now under investigation. DeWine’s office did not specify whether those providers are immigrants.