State Gets $3.5 Million in Medicaid Overcharging Settlement

(KCPW News) Utah’s Medicaid system is getting a much needed $3.5 million boost from two pharmaceutical companies who inflated their costs so heavily, Utah sued.

“Several years ago, we went to the legislature and told them we think fraud is being committed by 100-plus pharmaceutical companies by substantially overcharging the state of Utah for cost of medication, and we had paid tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars over the years because they were charging us too much,” said Attorney General Mark Shurtleff.

Shurtleff said Thursday that this payback is just the beginning. The state is still in talks with several more companies that he says tried to rip off Utahns, making big profits off every pill.

“We’ve been somewhat at fault, by we pay what they ask us to pay,” said Shurtleff. “You think you can trust the company and you expect a small or an appropriate mark up that is really, truly a fair market value for the product, and then when you go in there and start looking and you see a 30,000 percent increase or even a 100 percent increase, it’s just not appropriate.”

The AG’s office says its Utah Medicaid Fraud Control Unit has brought in $7.2 million to the state just since October of last year.