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No Viagra for sex offenders

It is so ridiculous we first thought it must be a joke: Convicted rapists and other high-risk sex offenders are walking out of pharmacies with erectile-dysfunction drugs paid for by taxpayers. An audit by the New York comptroller's office revealed that 198 of the state's high-risk sex offenders received Medicaid reimbursements for Viagra prescriptions from January 2000 until March 2005. This may not be unique to New York, and the Bush administration on Monday began looking for a way to close the dangerous loophole. Whatever their approach, the result should be that erectile dysfunction drugs are off limits to all high-risk sex offenders.

A spokeswoman for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services called this ridiculous situation an "unintented consequence" of a Medicaid law requiring prescription drug programs to include Viagra. But this should have been anticipated, and federal officials should not have been caught off-guard. The audit simply cross-checked the names of New York's sex offenders with those of Medicaid recipients with claims paid for Viagra prescriptions.

Regardless of the policy's intentions to provide Viagra to patients for a legitimate need, officials should prevent sex offenders who already have caused painful physical and emotional suffering from causing more harm. Providing government-funded erectile-dysfunction drugs to sex offenders puts the public at risk, and it is a waste of public money in a Medicaid system where costs are soaring. These are the sorts of abuses that give critics of Medicaid easy shots.

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., plans to sponsor legislation to close the loophole, and it should not be difficult to write. All convicted high-risk sex offenders should be barred from obtaining erectile-dysfunction drugs, no matter who pays the bill.

[Last modified May 24, 2005, 08:09:02]