[rkowalick]

Orson Welles also famously used an ambulance to get around to various radio shoes in NYC: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk%3AOrson_Welles

  Due to his busy radio schedule,
  he was hard pressed to find ways
  to get from job to job in busy New
  York City traffic. In an interview
  conducted in his later years,
  Welles tells how he "discovered
  that there was no law in New York 
  that you had to be sick to travel 
  in an ambulance." Therefore, he
  took to hiring ambulances to take 
  him, sirens blazing, through the
  crowded streets to get to various
  buildings.

[brightball]

There's a lady in South Carolina who's on medicaid that did that to the tune of costing the medicaid office about $400,000. I'll have to see if I can find the article.

EDIT: Found it http://www.live5news.com/story/22075845/live-5-news-investig...

[dogruck]

Shameful to see the officials congratulate themselves on busting the lady after she copped a free ambulance ride 100 times.

Seems like she was merely hacking a horribly inefficient system.

[malcolmgreaves]

Wrong: the shame is on the woman who knowingly abused the system and took money away from sick people. Just because you can hack a system doesn't mean that you should.

[cbhl]

Okay, but why does an ambulance ride in America cost $4,000 a pop? An Uber travelling the same distance would cost $4, maybe $40.

This is health care costs being out of control right there.

[dogruck]

What portion of the blame does the poor woman bear? What is the just punishment?

What about people who visit emergency rooms, for non-medical emergencies?

[brightball]

Can't argue that. Can you imagine the liability from the ambulance staff if they just didn't pick her up though?

[dogruck]

Yup, age old "that's not my job" strikes again.