HEALTHCARE/OBAMACARE(ACA)/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “Heading into the second week of the Affordable Care Act’s annual open-enrollment period, early sign-ups and traffic appear strong, according to industry and government officials, with more than 600,000 people selecting plans through the federal HealthCare.gov website in the initial days.
ACA insurers including Highmark Health, CareSource, Independence Blue Cross and Sanford Health Plan said they were so far seeing significantly increased sign-ups compared with last year’s enrollment period. But companies cautioned that it wasn’t clear that the early surge will be borne out in the final enrollment numbers, which likely won’t be known until next year…
In the first four days of ACA open enrollment, which started Nov. 1, 601,462 people selected insurance plans for next year using the federal marketplace, HealthCare.gov, according to the Trump administration. Of those, 137,322 counted as new customers, because they won’t be in an ACA plan at the end of 2017. The federal insurance exchange is used by 39 states.
Trump administration officials said the equivalent numbers for the first four days of last year’s enrollment period weren’t available. One administration official said it was ‘too early to form any kind of conclusion regarding comparisons’ to last year. In the first 12 days of last year’s open enrollment, 1,008,218 people selected plans, with 246,433 new consumers, the Obama administration reported at the time.”
-Anna Wilde Mathews, “Insurers See Jump in Sign-Ups for Affordable Care Act,” The Wall Street Journal online, Nov. 9, 2017 10:33am