November 12, 2026 – The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is continuing its aggressive efforts to eliminate persistent Medicare fraud conducted by bad actors in the hospice and home health sectors. CMS will extend its nationwide moratoria on new Medicare enrollments for hospices and home health agencies (HHAs) for an additional six months to protect beneficiaries and taxpayer dollars from fraud, waste, and abuse.
“We’ve made real progress over the past six months, but fraud in hospice and home health persists and our work isn’t finished,” said CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz. “Medicare beneficiaries deserve protection from these bad actors, and American taxpayers need to know the programs they rely on aren’t being bled dry by fraudsters.”
The initial moratoria, which began May 13, 2026, prevented potentially fraudulent operators from entering and exploiting Medicare. This pause allows CMS to conduct targeted investigations and deploy advanced data analytics to identify hospice and home health providers suspected of committing fraud and remove them from the Medicare program.
CMS has long recognized hospice and home health as areas at high risk for fraud, waste, and abuse. Although the moratoria have paused the enrollment of new hospices and home health agencies, the circumstances warranting the imposition of the moratoria have not yet abated. CMS determined that extending the moratoria for an additional six months is necessary so the agency can continue to monitor providers for indicators of fraud, and, when appropriate, take administrative actions such as payment suspension and revocation to combat this conduct.
As with the original moratoria, the extensions apply nationwide, preventing potentially fraudulent operators from circumventing the enrollment restrictions by moving across state lines. The moratoria extensions will continue to cover new applications for initial Medicare enrollment and certain changes in majority ownership. Unlike the May 2026 moratoria, the moratoria extensions will allow currently enrolled hospices and HHAs to add new practice locations within their existing enrollment. The extensions will not affect existing Medicare enrollments or prevent currently enrolled providers from continuing to deliver services.
The extensions build on CMS’ broader fraud enforcement efforts, including payment suspensions, site visits, fingerprint-based background checks, enhanced enrollment screening, pre- and post-claim review programs, and revocations.
Most recently, in October CMS site visit teams conducted a two-day operation targeting HHAs and hospices in California that resulted in 145 revocations of providers associated with more than $703 million in Medicare and Medicaid payments.
CMS is also strengthening its enrollment safeguards. The Calendar Year 2027 Home Health Prospective Payment System Final Rule finalized changes to Medicare enrollment rules that would make all revocations retroactive to the date of noncompliance, enabling recovery of payments made to noncompliant providers and protecting taxpayer funds. CMS also added or expanded grounds for enrollment denial or revocation, including requirements for hospices and home health agencies to reenroll after certain majority-ownership changes, as well as consequences for license, Medicaid, or federal healthcare program suspensions or revocations involving providers, owners, or managing employees and organizations. The rule is also designed to address: (1) clusters of hospices, home health agencies, and other provider and supplier types operating within small geographic areas; and (2) medical directors and administrators who oversee multiple hospices and/or oversee a hospice from such a distance that the person cannot realistically perform their required functions.
Additional information on the hospice and HHA moratoria can be found via the Federal Register at: https://public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2026-23242.pdf (Hospice) and https://public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2026-23241.pdf (Home Health).
Learn more about CMS’ fraud prevention efforts at: www.cms.gov/fraud
