The headlines that $8 billion in Medicare claims are fraudulent are classic cases of fake news.

The evidence for this dramatic accusation was from a ‘Medicare expert’ who, Google Scholar reveals, has published only five articles.

An analysis of the expert’s publications reveals one is a review of previous literature (presumably the introduction to her thesis), another is a survey of 27 practitioners (not a particularly large sample size given we have 160,000 medical practitioners in Australia) and another a survey of ‘stakeholders’ she feels are responsible for medical education.

Unfortunately, only three of the 18 medical schools were surveyed, and the Australian Medical Council — the largest ‘medical school’ in Australia — was also not surveyed.