Health insurer Cigna Group reports that it has struck a deal with the US on allegations that it overcharged the government’s Medicare Advantage programme by fabricating patient illness.
The Friday settlement includes a payout of nearly $172 million from Cigna. The U.S. Office of Inspector General and Cigna will sign a corporate integrity agreement, according to Cigna.
In October 2022, U.S. prosecutors in Manhattan claimed that Connecticut-based Cigna had acquired tens of millions of dollars in Medicare money between 2012 and 2019 by providing patients with bogus diagnoses in circumstances when the physicians the firm had hired had not performed the required tests.
For those 65 and over, Medicare is a government-run health insurance programme.