Medicare health plans

Chef Jermaine Wall stacks containers of soups at Community Servings, which prepares and delivers scratch-made, medically tailored meals to individuals & families living with critical & chronic illnesses, Tuesday, Jan. 12, 2021, in the Jamaica Plain neighborhood of Boston. Food is a growing focus for insurers as they look to improve the health of the people they cover and cut costs. Insurers first started covering Community Servings meals about five years ago, and CEO David Waters says they now cover close to 40%. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

Insurers add food to coverage menu as way to improve health

Jan. 23, 2021 8:53 AM EST

When COVID-19 first swarmed the United States, one health insurer called some customers with a question: Do you have enough to eat? Oscar Health wanted to know if people had adequate food for the next couple weeks and how they planned to stay stocked up while hunkering down at home. “We’ve seen...

FILE - In this April 2, 2015 file photo, Dr. Salomon Melgen arrives at the Martin Luther King Jr. Federal Courthouse for his arraignment in Newark, N.J. The prominent Florida eye doctor, convicted of defrauding Medicare out of $73 million, got out of prison early on Wednesday, Jan. 20, 2021, after former President Donald Trump commuted his sentence just hours before his term ended. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez, File)

Florida eye doctor gets clemency from Trump in health fraud

Jan. 21, 2021 10:45 AM EST

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) — Dr. Salomon Melgen once held political fundraisers at his palatial Florida home, hung out with prominent Democrats including New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez and made millions of dollars through his eye care practice. The problem, according to federal prosecutors, was that Melgen...

President-elect Joe Biden and his wife Jill Biden arrive at Andrews Air Force Base, Tuesday, Jan. 19, 2021, in Andrews Air Force Base, Md. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Biden charts new US direction, promises many Trump reversals

Jan. 20, 2021 12:34 AM EST

WASHINGTON (AP) — Stop. Stabilize. Then move — but in a vastly different direction. President-elect Joe Biden is pledging a new path for the nation after Donald Trump’s four years in office. That starts with confronting a pandemic that has killed 400,000 Americans and extends to sweeping...

Biogen agrees to pay $22M to settle kickback allegations

Dec. 17, 2020 3:49 PM EST

BOSTON (AP) — The Biogen pharmaceutical company on Thursday agreed to pay $22 million to resolve allegations that it illegally paid insurance co-payments for thousands of patients in order to collect Medicare revenue, federal prosecutors said. The company was accused of channeling money through two...

FILE - In this Oct. 10, 2020, file photo, President Donald Trump speaks from the Blue Room Balcony of the White House to a crowd of supporters in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)

Trump tries to revive stalled election-eve drug discounts

Dec. 9, 2020 4:49 PM EST

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration is trying to revive the president's stalled election-eve plan to send millions of Medicare recipients a $200 prescription discount card. A person familiar with the effort tells The Associated Press that government agencies still face legal questions about the...

Hospitals can care for Medicare patients at home in pandemic

Nov. 25, 2020 4:31 PM EST

Hospitals will be allowed to care for Medicare patients in their own homes during the pandemic under a government program announced Wednesday to help hospitals deal with the latest surge. Some hospitals already offered patients with private insurance the choice of getting care at home instead of in the hospital....