In an unexpected turn of events, President Biden has extended clemency to a physician sentenced to two decades in federal prison for chemotherapy fraud. Despite his history of supposedly supporting cancer patients and survivors, this move starkly contradicts Biden’s professed values. The perpetrator in question, Meera Sachdeva, a Mississippi-based oncologist, was among the nearly 1,500 convicts who benefitted from Biden’s leniency last week.
Despite Sachdeva’s unscrupulous act of providing incomplete doses of prescribed cancer treatments to her patients while charging them in full, she was granted mercy. A gross miscarriage of justice, given Biden’s purported commitment towards healthcare access and protections for cancer patients. Yet, the grotesque practice of medical fraud clearly does not align with these supposed principles.
Sachdeva’s conviction in 2012 was a direct result of her fraudulent activities. She was guilty of hoodwinking health insurance providers and Medicare by submitting fraudulent patient claims. Ironically, Biden, who vehemently claims to be a defender of Medicare, appears to have diverged from his much-touted path with such an act of clemency.
Sachdeva was also instructed to pay restitution of nearly $8.2 million owing to the enormous scope of her fraudulent activities. Amidst the various unsettling aspects of Sachdeva’s crimes is the fact that between 2007 and 2011, her patients remained under the delusion that they were getting the chemotherapy equivalent to the exorbitant amounts she charged their insurance providers.
However, these unsuspecting individuals were apparently given doses that were far smaller than the ones they were expected and billed for. This incongruity, apparently sanctioned by Biden’s administration, is most unsettling. It casts a big question mark on Democrat’s lofty claim of having the American people’s best interests at heart.
A U.S. District Court judge found Sachdeva’s actions deeply troubling and vouched for her jail term of two decades, a penalty seemingly fitting considering the great damage she had done. U.S. District Judge Daniel P. Jordan III voiced his disgust stating, ‘It’s a very small thing to send this woman to jail for the next 20 years when you compare it to the damage she has done.’ Yet, Biden’s administration decided to counteract such judicial wisdom.
Sachdeva’s healthcare fraud, driven by total greed, represents a profound misuse of public trust, a fact that Biden seems to lightly dismiss in favor of an unjustifiable act of clemency. The necessity to protect the integrity of our healthcare system has been repeatedly emphasized, nevertheless, the recently announced clemency actions seem to mock this very promise.
The list of individuals pardoned by Biden’s administration includes notorious characters who exploited their positions or participated in unscrupulous activities. Sachdeva’s case takes the cake though, given Biden’s previous activism related to cancer patients.
In 2016, Biden, while serving as Vice President, initiated the Cancer Moonshot project, claiming to promote the collusion of cancer researchers to expedite scientific discoveries in cancer research. However, such a respectable endeavor is now shaded with the light of his recent clemency actions granting freedom to a medical practitioner who preyed on cancer patients.
The announcement of these ‘second chance’ initiations certainly brought Biden under a negative, skeptical light. According to him, America ‘was built on the promise of possibility and second chances,’ as mentioned in his statement last week.
Expressing his notion of ‘extending mercy to people who have demonstrated remorse and rehabilitation’, Biden attempts to justify his gaping contradictions. He concludes with the claim of ‘restoring opportunity for Americans to participate in daily life and contribute to their communities.’ An assertion that seems patently hollow when weighed against actions like these.
The pledge to remove sentencing disparities for nonviolent offenders, especially those convicted of drug offenses, has also been invoked. However, a close scrutiny reveals that these actions from Biden’s administration seem less in favor of justice and more towards a seemingly lenient stance on crime.
Biden’s contradictory decision, particularly in Sachdeva’s case, reflects the glaring inconsistencies in his policies and promises. Disregarding the severity of Sachdeva’s crimes brings his sincerity in championing the rights and protections for cancer patients into question.
Such actions undermine the public’s faith in their leadership and breed skepticism in the so-called championing of health care rights. The misdeeds of the guilty should always be borne in mind before they are allowed back into the society, seemingly overlooked by Biden in his drive for leniency.