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After anemic enrollment in the federal health insurance marketplace, several states running their own online exchanges are reporting a rapid increase in the number of people signing up for coverage, a trend officials say is encouraging for President Obama’s health-care law.

By mid-November, the 14 state-based marketplaces reported data showing enrollment has nearly doubled from last month, jumping to about 150,000 from 79,000, according to state and federal statistics. The nonprofit Commonwealth Fund, which has been tracking the data, called the most recent numbers “a November enrollment surge.”

California, which has had about 80,000 sign-ups, is now reporting about 2,000 enrollments per day. New York and Washington state reported enrollment numbers in the tens of thousands as of this week.

A total of 27,000 enrollments were reported in October for the federal marketplace in which 36 states are relying on HealthCare.gov; the number that has not been updated in November.

“It’s not all doom and gloom,” Kaiser Family Foundation President Drew Altman said. “What this says is that the problems are system problems, not problems with demand or interest.”

Health policy experts have always expected that enrollment would be slower in October because coverage doesn’t begin until January. What they did not expect was the array of technical issues that would make it difficult for even the most eager shoppers to purchase coverage.

The state exchanges that have performed well “were just better equipped and ready to handle high capacity” of users, said Sara Collins, a vice president at the Commonwealth Fund, a health policy nonprofit group. They worked out some of their technical issues, testing early on in the summer, she said.

Those states have also conducted stronger outreach, aggressively targeting young people, who generally have fewer health problems and are considered critical to the success of the exchanges.

Some of the state exchanges are seeing the pace of enrollment pick up daily. California has been out in front; the state’s enrollments have grown steadily in November and now account for nearly half of all health law sign-ups. The state has had its strongest two weeks of enrollment this month.

“We’re seeing much larger numbers than we expected,” Covered California Executive Director Peter Lee told reporters this week.

Connecticut officials say they have seen about 14 percent of their expected enrollees sign up through mid-November.

And in Washington state, health law enrollment has nearly doubled, from 55,000 at the end of October to 98,000 through Nov. 14.

“We’re definitely seeing interest continuing to build,” exchange spokesman Michael Marchand said. “I fully suspect we may have half our enrollment coming in in December.”

Health and Human Services officials also announced Friday that insurers in Florida, Texas and Ohio will launch a pilot program to allow consumers to directly enroll in coverage, bypassing HealthCare.gov. This type of enrollment was always supposed to be an option for consumers, but the online system has not worked properly.

Also Friday, Jeff Zients, who was appointed by Obama to fix HealthCare.gov’s problems, said he was “very confident” that the federal site would be able to handle 50,000 simultaneous users by the end of this month. “The site was originally intended to handle this load, and improvements will bring it up to this level,” Zients said. “We will have the capacity that was intended.” http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/november-surge-seen-in-obamacar
e-sign-ups-in-states/2013/11/22/4233cc50-539e-11e3-9fe0-fd2ca728e67c_story.html?hpid=z1

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Originally posted by Niki2:

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After anemic enrollment in the federal health insurance marketplace, several states running their own online exchanges are reporting a rapid increase in the number of people signing up for coverage, a trend officials say is encouraging for President Obama’s health-care law.

By mid-November, the 14 state-based marketplaces reported data showing enrollment has nearly doubled from last month, jumping to about 150,000 from 79,000, according to state and federal statistics. The nonprofit Commonwealth Fund, which has been tracking the data, called the most recent numbers “a November enrollment surge.”

California, which has had about 80,000 sign-ups, is now reporting about 2,000 enrollments per day. New York and Washington state reported enrollment numbers in the tens of thousands as of this week.

A total of 27,000 enrollments were reported in October for the federal marketplace in which 36 states are relying on HealthCare.gov; the number that has not been updated in November.

“It’s not all doom and gloom,” Kaiser Family Foundation President Drew Altman said. “What this says is that the problems are system problems, not problems with demand or interest.”

Health policy experts have always expected that enrollment would be slower in October because coverage doesn’t begin until January. What they did not expect was the array of technical issues that would make it difficult for even the most eager shoppers to purchase coverage.

The state exchanges that have performed well “were just better equipped and ready to handle high capacity” of users, said Sara Collins, a vice president at the Commonwealth Fund, a health policy nonprofit group. They worked out some of their technical issues, testing early on in the summer, she said.

Those states have also conducted stronger outreach, aggressively targeting young people, who generally have fewer health problems and are considered critical to the success of the exchanges.

Some of the state exchanges are seeing the pace of enrollment pick up daily. California has been out in front; the state’s enrollments have grown steadily in November and now account for nearly half of all health law sign-ups. The state has had its strongest two weeks of enrollment this month.

“We’re seeing much larger numbers than we expected,” Covered California Executive Director Peter Lee told reporters this week.

Connecticut officials say they have seen about 14 percent of their expected enrollees sign up through mid-November.

And in Washington state, health law enrollment has nearly doubled, from 55,000 at the end of October to 98,000 through Nov. 14.

“We’re definitely seeing interest continuing to build,” exchange spokesman Michael Marchand said. “I fully suspect we may have half our enrollment coming in in December.”

Health and Human Services officials also announced Friday that insurers in Florida, Texas and Ohio will launch a pilot program to allow consumers to directly enroll in coverage, bypassing HealthCare.gov. This type of enrollment was always supposed to be an option for consumers, but the online system has not worked properly.

Also Friday, Jeff Zients, who was appointed by Obama to fix HealthCare.gov’s problems, said he was “very confident” that the federal site would be able to handle 50,000 simultaneous users by the end of this month. “The site was originally intended to handle this load, and improvements will bring it up to this level,” Zients said. “We will have the capacity that was intended.” http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/november-surge-seen-in-obamacar
e-sign-ups-in-states/2013/11/22/4233cc50-539e-11e3-9fe0-fd2ca728e67c_story.html?hpid=z1

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Originally posted by ElvisChrist:

Or could it be that you're just a racist cunt?

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