-
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." -
New Obamacare enrollment map reveals surprises...
A Washington-based consultancy has compared new Obamacare data to projected enrollment in each state, a handy tool that shows states such as Idaho, Montana and North Carolina doing quite well even though they’ve flown under the radar and relied on the federal government to run their new insurance marketplace.
Avalere took state-by-state data released Wednesday by the Health and Human Services Department (HHS) and applied it to their in-house projections and a government estimate that 6 million people would enroll in private health plans under President Obama’s overhaul between Oct. 1 and March 31.
It displayed each state’s progress as a percentage on a color-coded map, revealing a patchwork of winners and losers across America with a month and a half left to go in the health care law’s inaugural enrollment period.
HHS said 3.3 million Americans have enrolled on the state-based markets, or “exchanges,” since October, with about 1.1 million signing up in January alone. The exchanges allow people to compare plans and sometimes qualify for government subsidies to help them pay their premiums, although a botched web rollout on the federal portal, HealthCare.gov, prevented many people from enrolling in the fall.
“The latest data shows that exchange enrollment continues to rebound following early technological problems, although progress is uneven across states,” said Caroline Pearson, a vice president at Avalere. “The question remains if the final enrollment surge at the end of March will make up the ground lost in October and November.”
Idaho has enrolled 98 percent of its projected pool, while Montana and North Carolina each enrolled more than 80 percent with a month and a half left in the six-month enrollment period.
Among states that ran their own exchanges, California has exceeded Avalere projections at 118 percent, while New York — frequently described as a success story for its sheer volume of sign-ups — has enrolled just 241,200 out of 616,000 consumers, leaving them at 39 percent of expected enrollment.
Washington’s state-run exchange is faring well at 94 percent, Kentucky’s highly touted exchange chalked up 77 percent. Vermont, too, has brought 77 percent on its state-run exchange.
Several states that embraced the Affordable Care Act and set up their own exchanges put up relatively poor numbers.
Maryland came in at 38 percent of expected enrollment, Minnesota had 40 percent and Massachusetts came in at just 17 percent. The District of Columbia brought in 22 percent.
Oregon rose above criticism of its exchange, to an extent, by bringing in 52 percent of expected enrollment even as it relies on paper applications instead of its website.
Florida, a state that is relying on HealthCare.gov, looked good under Avalere’s metric, at 74 percent.
Read more: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...#ixzz2tgmTvXhS
Follow us: @washtimes on Twitter
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...als-surprises/"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." -
Obamacare Enrollment Surges to 3.3 Million...
Obamacare Enrollment Surges to 3.3 Million, but These 5 States Lagged Far Behind
By Sean Williams | More Articles
February 15, 2014 | Comments (2)
You could certainly say that we are getting closer and closer to crunch time for Obamacare with the coverage cutoff date to obtain health insurance in 2014 without violating the individual mandate rapidly approaching on March 31. I've been pushing this date as the most key Obamacare deadline of its opening campaign for months since people are naturally procrastinators, so I'm anticipating quite a surge of enrollments in March.
On Wednesday, though, we received our latest monthly update (link opens PDF) from the Department of Health and Human Services on the enrollment progress behind Obamacare. While total enrollments are still pacing well below the eventual 7 million-person target set by HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, enrollment nonetheless spiked 53%, or 1.146 million, to just shy of 3.3 million people.
http://www.fool.com/investing/genera...-but-thes.aspx"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."Comment
-
A guide to understanding Obamacare’s sign-up numbers
By Sarah Kliff
February 13 at 11:05 am
Each time the Obama administration publishes new health law enrollment numbers, they seem to create more questions than answers. Counting the number of people who have signed up for Obamacare turns out to be vexingly difficult -- and, after four months of open enrollment, now seems like an excellent time to break down what we do and don't know about the exact number of people gaining coverage through the Affordable Care Act.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...gn-up-numbers/"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."Comment
-
Medicaid Expansion, Red-State Style
Medicaid Expansion, Red-State Style
By THE EDITORIAL BOARD
FEB. 11, 2014
Some 20 states have refused to expand their Medicaid programs to cover uninsured low-income people, an important element of the health reform law. Now several states that had been opposed, mostly for ideological reasons, are seeking to cover newly eligible Medicaid beneficiaries through private insurance.
They want to redirect the very generous federal matching funds that would be provided for expanding Medicaid and use the money instead to provide subsidies for eligible people to buy insurance on health care exchanges. The idea makes sense, politically and substantively, provided the coverage is comprehensive and there are safeguards to protect poor people from unaffordable premiums and co-payments.
Using Medicaid funds to buy private insurance could give beneficiaries access to a wider group of doctors and ease the churn problem, in which patients are tossed back and forth between Medicaid and private coverage as their income changes. Expansion would also benefit millions of people below the poverty line who, because of a quirk in the health reform law, would otherwise be ineligible for coverage through either Medicaid or the exchanges.
Federal health officials have approved waivers that allow Arkansas and Iowa to use Medicaid dollars to pay private insurers to provide the coverage, and similar waivers have been proposed or are under consideration for Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Utah and others. For states led by conservative Republican governors or legislators, this detour through private insurance coverage may be the only way to expand Medicaid to people who need it.
But it will be a struggle from state to state to get this right. In Arkansas, the first state to adopt this approach, a Democratic governor and Republican-led Legislature agreed on a praiseworthy expansion last year, but changing political tides have thrown doubt on whether the this tactic to expand Medicaid will be continued. The state has already placed 83,000 Medicaid beneficiaries on the exchanges and was projected to enroll 250,000 in all. Every Medicaid beneficiary on an exchange plan is supposed to get all the benefits of traditional Medicaid and pay no greater cost-sharing.
Some states in negotiating with the federal government for a waiver have tried to get special exemptions from other Medicaid requirements (which Arkansas did not get). For instance, Iowa asked for and got federal permission to avoid paying for nonemergency transportation to medical appointments, a standard Medicaid benefit, for a year, at which point federal officials will evaluate whether it has harmed beneficiaries’ access to care.
Federal officials also compromised with the state on premiums it wanted to charge beneficiaries in private plans. The state was not allowed to charge premiums to people below the poverty line but was allowed to charge small premiums for beneficiaries above the poverty line, as was Michigan under a separate waiver. That has already triggered demands by Republicans in Arkansas to drop coverage of transportation costs and charge beneficiaries more.
The uncertainty is whether expansion through private policies, which is supposed to be budget-neutral for the federal government, will end up costing more money than traditional Medicaid, which pays providers less than do private health plans. If so, states may seek to reduce the number of people covered or benefits provided, neither of which seems desirable. Even so, the risk seems worth taking.
Persuading more Republican-dominated states to participate could greatly bolster political support for the health care reforms. Congressional Republicans might find it hard to damage a law that has support from both Republicans and Democrats at the state level.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/12/op...html?src=rechp"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."Comment
Tweet
Comment