China to extend crackdown on medical insurance fraud

BEIJING, Dec. 8 (Xinhua) -- A national operation involving police and health authorities to crack down on medical insurance fraud will be extended for another year, the National Healthcare Security Administration (NHSA) said on Wednesday.

The operation, jointly launched in April by the NHSA, the Ministry of Public Security and the National Health Commission, has achieved positive results, senior NHSA official Jiang Chengjia said at a press briefing in Beijing.

By the end of October, a total of 3,970 cases had been investigated in the course of the joint operation, and the national medical insurance fund had suspended service contracts with 142 medical institutions and terminated contracts with 61 institutions, Jiang said.

The operation had been scheduled to conclude by the end of this year.

Notable progress has been made in curbing medical insurance fraud since the NHSA was founded in 2018, Jiang said.

Healthcare security regulatory agencies across China conducted approximately 2.34 million inspections of medical institutions related to insurance fraud from 2018 to October this year.

Through these inspections, approximately 50.6 billion yuan (7.94 billion U.S. dollars) in medical insurance funds were recovered, Jiang said.