On Friday, 12 May in Brussels, the Benelux countries (Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg) signed a declaration of intent in which they make a commitment to cooperate in the fight against cross-border healthcare fraud.
Alain de Muyser, the Benelux Deputy Secretary-General, quoted by the Belga press agency stated, “Our aim is to generate the surplus value that Benelux cooperation can bring and, later on, put forward recommendations to our governments”. A working group has been put in charge of introducing an exchange of good practices, an information system to be used by the appropriate authorities and, at a more general level, to improve cooperation for identifying cross-border fraud and reporting on it. These three countries intend to play a leading role and will communicate the results of their research to the European Commission.
During this occasion, the European Healthcare Fraud and Corruption Network (EHFCN) presented an investigation that highlighted the mechanisms currently used to commit fraud and which often take advantage of the borders to escape controls. In 2015 alone, the amount recovered from fraud stood at €11.5 million in Belgium, explained the report. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)