Early signals suggest the majority of the 2.2 million people who sought to enroll in private insurance through new marketplaces through Dec. 28 were previously covered elsewhere, raising questions about how swiftly this part of the health overhaul will be able to make a significant dent in the number of uninsured.More at that top link.
Insurers, brokers and consultants estimate at least two-thirds of those consumers previously bought their own coverage or were enrolled in employer-backed plans.
The data, based on surveys of enrollees, are preliminary. But insurers say the tally of newly insured consumers is falling short of their expectations, a worrying trend for an industry looking to the law to expand the ranks of its customers.
About 48 million Americans were uninsured in 2012. The health law is expected to cut 25 million from that total by expanding state-run Medicaid programs and the pool of privately insured people who buy through state marketplaces, also called exchanges.
Only 11% of consumers who bought new coverage under the law were previously uninsured, according to a McKinsey & Co. survey of consumers thought to be eligible for the health-law marketplaces. The result is based on a sampling of 4,563 consumers performed between November and January, of whom 389 had enrolled in new insurance.
One reason for people declining to purchase plans was affordability. That was cited by 52% of those who had shopped for a new plan but not purchased one in McKinsey's most recent sampling, performed in January. Another common problem was technical challenges in buying the plans, which 30% mentioned.
Health Markets Inc., an insurance agency that enrolled around 7,500 people in exchange plans, said 65% of its enrollees had prior coverage. Around 10% were dropping out of employer coverage, either because the employer stopped offering its plan or because they could qualify for subsidies on the marketplaces. Fifteen percent had previous individual plans canceled, and 40% decided to switch into coverage bought through an exchange from previous individual plans.
At Michigan-based Priority Health, only 25% of more than 1,000 enrollees surveyed in plans that comply with the law were previously uninsured, said Joan Budden, chief marketing officer.
The trend underscores a central test for the health law, whose marketplaces are meant to steer a broad cross section of new paying customers to private insurers.
"One of the intents of the law was to address the uninsured problem in our country," said David M. Cordani, chief executive of insurer Cigna Corp. Cigna doesn't yet know what coverage its health-marketplace enrollees previously held.
Many health plans and providers are looking for the expansion of coverage to fuel growth. Insurers need to draw healthy uninsured people to offset costs, given that plans can no longer deny coverage to people with pre-existing conditions.
People have until the end of March to choose plans under the law, so more of the uninsured could still flock to the marketplaces.
"We are in the middle of a sustained six-month open-enrollment period, and we have seen a strong interest in the product overall across the range of demographics so far," said Aaron Albright, a spokesman for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. which is overseeing the rollout. "We are ramping up outreach activities so that more Americans learn how they can now benefit from affordable health insurance."
And from Ed Driscoll, "Krauthammer: ‘Stop the Bailout — Now’."
0 comments:
Post a Comment