ARE WE STUPID — OR WHAT?

NEW YORK

SEX OFFENDERS GET VIAGRA VIA MEDICAID

ALBANY — Scores of convicted rapists and other high-risk sex offenders in New York have been getting Viagra paid for by Medicaid for the last five years, the state’s comptroller said Sunday. Audits by Comptroller Alan Hevesi’s office showed that between January 2000 and March 2005, 198 sex offenders in New York received Medicaid-reimbursed Viagra after their convictions. Those included crimes against children as young as 2 years old, he said.

Hevesi asked Michael Leavitt, secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, in a letter Sunday to “take immediate action to ensure that sex offenders do not receive erectile dysfunction medication paid for by taxpayers.”

From The Miami Herald, May 23rd, 2005