Medicare aborts apparent plan to pause all physician payments during shutdown

Medicare aborts apparent plan to pause all physician payments during shutdown 
MedPageToday; by Shannon Firth; 10/16/25 
Amid the federal government shutdown, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on Wednesday appeared to announce a pause on all Medicare payments to doctors, but then quickly backed off. An initial notice stated that CMS had instructed all Medicare Administrative Contractors to temporarily hold "all claims paid under the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule, ground ambulance transport claims, and all Federally Qualified Health Center claims" with dates of service of Oct. 1 and later. ... But within hours, the agency issued another notice saying it would only stop processing claims related to expired programs such as certain telehealth and hospital-at-home services, both of which had been expected ahead of the shutdown.