In the 10 months since Arizona officials announced an investigation into massive Medicaid billing fraud, they’ve maintained the abuse was mostly limited to a small share of the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System: behavioral health providers that exploited the agency’s fee-for-service plans.
But the agency acknowledged this week that fraud also spread into its managed care organizations, which oversee 90% of AHCCCS services—meaning the crisis ultimately affected the agency’s entire provider ecosystem, not just those highlighted as the epicenter of the scandal.