HealthCare.gov Gets 222,000 New Sign-Ups in First Week

[question everything]

Source: WSJ

HealthCare.gov, which opened for its second enrollment period Nov. 15, has gotten off to a far better start than last year, figures show.

About 222,000 people made new sign-ups for insurance in the site’s first week of selling health coverage for 2015, while some 240,000 people renewed plans they bought on the federal insurance exchange last year, administration officials said Wednesday.

(snip)

But the latest numbers also signal steep challenges ahead as the government tries to meet enrollment goals. Federal officials said Wednesday they are continuing to encourage millions of people to come back to the site to review their coverage and make any changes—while ensuring the site’s technical side can handle the heavy traffic.

The deadline for signing up for coverage is Feb. 15, but current policyholders have only until Dec. 15 to make changes to their coverage for the new year. If those policyholders don’t come back to HealthCare.gov to see the latest offerings, the government automatically will renew their existing plans.


Read more: http://online.wsj.com/articles/healthcare-gov-gets-222-000-new-sign-ups-in-first-week-1417017059

[Ex Lurker]

1. 222.000 more people to be screwed by Scalia and Thomas NT

[csziggy]

3. The ACA may not be ideal but it is better than what was available before

For my husband and me it was NOTHING without him working a job he detests for far less pay than he deserves. He was working for insurance, period. We had made more money by running our farm but could not get insurance for any price. Without my husband's help I could no longer run the farm so we had to close that as a business and lease the facilities.

The timing was good - three weeks after he took a job off the farm I messed up my knee and had to get emergency surgery on it. During the time he's worked for insurance, I had the other knee worked on, a hysterectomy, a shoulder repaired, both knees replaced and carpal tunnel surgery on both arms. He had to get foot surgery to repair a damaged ligament. Without the insurance he worked for we would have been bankrupt and destitute.

Now with the ACA we can get insurance AND we also get a subsidy. My husband is retiring as of the end of the year and we've already set up our insurance through the HealthCare.gov site. We have as good a policy as he got through his job, for less per month than his share of his employer supplied coverage. And we were able to shop around rather than take what the employer choose to supply. We could select a plan that covered our choice of doctors for the first time in over a decade!

Even if we were not eligible for a subsidy, we could still get insurance because of ACA - something we could not get privately before. Yes, the cost would be high, but less than paying for health care out of pocket - which we have done. In 1993 I had to get a shoulder rebuilt - over $12,000 out of pocket, not counting the physical therapy. That was a deal since the surgeons and surgical facility took pity and gave me discounts. Nowadays any one of the operations I had since 2001 would have cost more than that - just the hospital cost for one knee replacement was over $70,000.

I agree the ACA is not what we wanted - but it is far better than nothing!

[question everything]

4. It certainly is. For one, it allowed individuals to leave their dead end jobs

and start with a new one, even one that does not "provide benefits." All they had to do is sign with one of the exchange. That is, if one lives in a state that joined it.

[csziggy]

5. We live in Florida so had to go through the federal exchange

Which I trust far more than anything Rick Scott might have set up.

Of course, now we have to worry about what the Supreme Court will do. If they throw out subsidies for those going through the federal exchanges, we're screwed. The insurance payment without the subsidy will be as much as we will be taking in each month so we'll have to dip into out retirement funds - and reduce our income for the future.

My husband will be eligible for Medicare in two years, though, and I should be able to be on his policy if we're reading the information correctly - that was part of our calculations. He's just completely worn down by the grind at his job.

I do think about starting another business. I can no longer do the farm work, so that is out, but there are other things I'm interested in and a need in the community for. I'm just not sure that I can physically keep up with a business even if the work is light duty. After all the operations and fifteen years on, the years of forced inactivity have taken their toll.

[Fred Sanders]

2. "The government" will not renew lapsing policies, the insurance companies will...subtle lies by WSJ.