What you describe isn’t medicaid fraud. That would be falsely billing medicaid for treatment you didn’t receive. If you did sign up, medicaid would only pay the hospital what they allow per their billing schedule, a small fraction of the $8,000 they want you to pay.
The “scam” is that hospitals are not transparent about how much they are going to charge you. And that they charge uninsured people far more than what they get paid for insured patients. They also know it’s a bit of a pain to shop hospitals while you are hurt and in need of care. So, they bill you $8,000 because they can. Being uninsured can be expensive, and that’s not going to change any time soon.
bttt