by Ben Vernia | April 10th, 2023
On April 7, the Department of Justice announced that a North Carolina-based pharmacy had agreed to settle whistleblowers’ allegations that the company submitted claims for prescriptions it had never filled. According to DOJ’s press release:
MedCare Clinic & Pharmacy, LLC (MedCare), located in Indian Trail, North Carolina, has agreed to pay $213,677 to resolve allegations that it violated the False Claims Act by knowingly billing federal health care programs for medications that were never dispensed.
The United States alleged that, from Jan. 1, 2016, through Dec. 31, 2019, MedCare billed both Medicare Part D and North Carolina Medicaid for 200 prescription medications that MedCare never distributed to beneficiaries. According to the government’s allegations, inventory records showed that MedCare did not buy enough of these medications to fill all of the prescriptions billed to these health care programs.
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The government announced that the whistleblowers will receive $53,419.43 of the settlement (a 25% relators’ share).