Some 4,000 Virginians enrolled in health insurance plans last month

[TomCADem]

Source: Stafford County Sun

Almost 4,000 Virginians enrolled in health insurance plans through the new federal marketplace last month, quadrupling the number of enrollees during the troubled rollout of the electronic exchange in October.

* * *
"You can't expect more than 25 percent in the first year," said Doug Gray, executive director of the Virginia Association of Health Plans. "It just isn't going to happen."

With less than two weeks for people to enroll for coverage to begin Jan. 1, health care advocates say the federal website for enrolling people in Virginia and 35 other states has vastly improved since October, when the marketplace enrolled just 1,023 people here.

"It's night and day," said Jill A. Hanken, senior attorney at the Virginia Poverty Law Center, which is helping people navigate the process at nine locations across the state.


Read more: http://www.staffordcountysun.com/news/local/article_591239aa-6787-11e3-b6a2-001a4bcf6878.html

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It is a good thing that Virginia now has a Democratic Governor and AG who will not try to obstruct the implementation of the ACA.

[fbc]

1. I'm confused... is that supposed to be good?

Virginia has over 8 million people. According to this, they have 984,000 uninsured: http://www.vhcf.org/data/profile-of-the-uninsured/

That means if they have insured a total of 5000 people, they have insured less than 1% of their uninsured.

Is my math off or is this a failure story rather than a success story?

[BumRushDaShow]

3. That's the November number. nt

[freedom fighter jh]

4. November was still a nightmare on the federal exchange.

Virginia, not having its own state exchange, uses the federal exchange.

The federal exchange was still operating poorly through most of November. If there was an error in your application you could not fix it. You were told that you could fix it but you could not, so you could either let it go or waste a lot of time trying to fix it, but either way you could not get anywhere.

In the past couple of weeks it's been much, much better. Because it can now process complete applications smoothly, the federal exchange is probably getting massively more enrollments now than it did last month.

[woo me with science]

2. Terry McAuliffe is a Third Way corporate liar

who is already dragging his feet on expanding Medicaid in Virginia.

After spending the campaign talking about how he would use the budget to expedite the expansion of Medicaid in Virginia, he is already backtracking and saying that he wants to work with Republicans instead, so Virginians should know it might take a long, long time...

Va. Medicaid expansion still faces uphill battle, even after McAuliffe win
http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/blog/2013/11/va-medicaid-expansion-still-faces.html?page=all

During the campaign, McAuliffe indicated he might try to expand Medicaid via the budget, the political equivalent of dousing all of Richmond in lighter fluid —Republicans believe that would violate the law that created the 10-member commission.

That’s not the tone his transition team is sounding. Spokesman Brian Coy told me he wants to build a foundation for Medicaid expansion, work with both parties and proceed with reforms collaboratively.

“He’s committed to this as long as it takes,” Coy said.

He is also talking about retaining Mr. Mandatory Transvaginal Ultrasound, Bill Hazel, as his Health and Human Resources Secretary:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024184917
http://rhrealitycheck.org/article/2013/12/12/terry-mcauliffe-considers-retaining-gov-bob-mcdonnells-secretary-of-health/