A financial loss of 18 million euros and avoided payments for 29 million 916 thousand euros: investigation by the Court of Auditors into private clinics in Campania 'hired' for the coronavirus emergency.
The investigation is still ongoing and was revealed by the regional prosecutor Maurizio Stanco in his report, drawn up for the inauguration of the judicial year of the Court of Auditors of Campania. The story of the control activity of the Court of Auditors originates from the transmission to the accounting prosecutor's office, in May 2020, of an economic-financial report relating to the contribution of private healthcare to the epidemiological emergency dictated by the spread of Covid-19. On the basis of the report, the hypothesis of damage to the treasury was formulated in light of the stipulation of a contract between the Campania Region and Aiop Campania (Italian Association of Private Hospitals), on March 28, 2020 to deal with the Covid-19 emergency, which provided for "contractual conditions harbingers - explains Stanco - of the payment of significant financial flows from the Region to the contracted clinics regardless of the value of the actual production, that is to say from the necessary prior verification of the Covid care interventions actually carried out, in a completely flat-rate manner and without providing for the obligation to report on the activities carried out".
The prosecuting office proceeded to issue a delegation for investigative investigations to the Guardia di Finanza - Economic and Financial Police Unit, and in the information acquired it was highlighted how in the period (March-April 2020) the nursing homes issued illegitimate invoices as they included, in addition to the remuneration, on a monthly basis, of the service actually rendered, also the compensation attributable to services never rendered. For each Health Authority, the amounts due for services rendered for hospital admissions of Covid patients were quantified for the months of March and April 2020; the amounts invoiced as a monthly advance of the structure budget attributable to the agreement of 28 March and the following addendum of 3 April. The investigative impulse of the prosecution and the consequent activity of the delegated police have allowed to avoid the payment of the amounts invoiced for the month of April, and thus, for each ASL, it has been possible to identify the illicit sums paid and the illicit sums not paid. The damage to the treasury has been quantified at 18.056.582,12 euros, while the sums whose payment has been avoided is 29.916.567,26 euros.
Article published on March 5, 2021 - 11pm
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