During his recent primetime address, President Obama said health care in America is "a system that is currently full of waste and abuse" where "too much of the hard-earned savings and tax dollars we spend on health care don't make us any healthier... is also true when it comes to Medicare and Medicaid." In fact, he said that there are "hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and fraud" in Medicare that "don't improve the care of seniors." We agree.

We believe that fraud constitutes at least ten percent ($100 billion) of the nearly one trillion in taxpayer dollars that Medicare and Medicaid will spend this year. That is likely a conservative estimate. Harvard's Dr. Malcolm Sparrow, author of the seminal book "License to Steal," estimates that the losses could easily be in the 20 percent or 30 percent range, even as high as 35 percent, but he insists that we ought not to have to guess. He believes the government should measure the losses and report them accurately.

The American people firmly support anti-fraud efforts. Eighty-eight percent in a July 2009 poll by Zogby identified, "eliminate fraud" as their preferred way to pay for modernizing our health care system. "Reduce medical errors" came third on that list with only 72 percent support. Moreover, an Insider Advantage poll also from July found that by a margin of 61-27 Americans believe the issues of fraud and waste in Medicare and Medicaid should be addressed prior to the creation of a new government-run health program.

The story of convicted murderer Guillermo Denis Gonzalez illustrates the vulnerability of government run health programs to fraud. Gonzalez was released from prison in 2004 after serving a twelve year sentence for a murder conviction. Two years later he bought a Medicare-licensed equipment supply company and duly notified Medicare authorities that he was the new owner. In 2007 he submitted $586,953 in false claims to Medicare and got paid for some of them. In 2008 he is alleged to have killed and dismembered a man.

The fact that a convicted murderer with a seventh grade education could so easily become a supplier to our largest health program and begin defrauding it illustrates how pervasive fraud is in America's government-run health care programs. If only the Gonzalez case were an isolated incident.

Miami Dade Country is notorious for health care fraud. There are more licensed home health agencies in Miami Dade County than the entire state of California. In 2005, billing submissions from Miami Dade to Medicare for HIV infusion therapy were 22 times higher than the rest of the country combined. New York also has a serious problem with fraud. A private study of New York's Medicaid in 2006 found that one-quarter of that then-$44 billion program cannot be explained.

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