A last-minute surge nearly doubled the number of Illinoisans who signed up for insurance policies offered under President Barack Obama’s health care law in the first year of open enrollment, administration officials said Thursday.
From March 2 to April 19, nearly 104,000 people in the state signed up for coverage, bringing the total to 217,492, beating the federal government’s original estimate of 143,000 for the state by 52 percent.
Still, the preliminary figures fall short of Illinois state officials’ internal goal of enrolling 300,000 in 2014 on the private health insurance exchange set up by the Affordable Care Act. The data also fail to offer a complete picture of actual health plan enrollment because it includes people who have not paid their first month’s premium, the final step to gaining coverage.Nationwide, slightly more than 8 million Americans selected private plans through April 19, nearly half of whom signed up in March and in an extended enrollment period that ended April 15, according to federal data.
Illinois and Obama administration officials cheered the figures, saying the law succeeded in ensuring that health coverage is more accessible and affordable for more consumers than ever before.
The enrollment numbers show “that we are well on our way to achieving our goal of creating a culture of coverage in Illinois,” said Jennifer Koehler, executive director of Get Covered Illinois, the state’s enrollment vehicle. “This is the start of a new state of health care in Illinois, and Get Covered Illinois will be here to help people gain access to health coverage every step along the way.”
Of those who selected plans in Illinois, about 168,000, or 77 percent, did so with the help of federal subsidies aimed at offsetting the cost of buying insurance. Those subsidies, a key pillar of the law, were available to those with annual incomes of up to four times the federal poverty level, or about $31,700 for an individual and $95,400 for a family of four.
The flood of sign-ups in the last seven weeks included a wave of young consumers prized by insurers because they typically cost less to cover. About 1.2 million of the 3.8 million Americans who selected plans in the final period were under age 35, accounting for about 31 percent of sign-ups.
That brought the total number of enrollees from ages 18 to 34 to 2.2 million nationwide, or about 28 percent of the total. Illinois mirrored the national figures.
Often called “young invincibles,” these consumers, in theory, will help offset the costs of insuring older, sicker people, who tend to ring up more health care spending. Younger people are seen as crucial to balance insurers’ risk pools and keep premiums in check.
In all, 72,696, or about a third, of those who selected plans in Illinois were under age 35.
On a conference call with reporters Thursday, federal officials predicted health insurance prices will be stable for 2015.
“We believe, based on the data that we’ve seen and independent data that’s out there, that premiums will be stable, and that the risk pool is sufficiently large and varied to support that kind of pricing in every state,” said Mike Hash, a top health care official at the Department of Health and Human Services.
Next year’s premiums have become a political flash point and figure to play a major role in the fall congressional elections. Republicans have warned of double-digit price increases next year, particularly in states with lower-than-expected enrollment.
Experts warn it’s impossible to draw broad conclusions on premiums because the picture will vary from state to state.
“While there is a lot of focus on the national numbers, it’s what is happening state by state that will affect how much premiums rise next year,” said Larry Levitt, Kaiser Family Foundation senior vice president. “Insurers set premiums based on who signs up in a state. If lots of healthy people enrolled in California, that doesn’t spill over into Texas and help the risk pool there.”
Though the preliminary figures for Illinois suggest the state will exceed federal enrollment projections, the law’s critics contend that far fewer of the new enrollees have paid their premiums.
“Even if everyone who signed up (in March and April) pays, we’re looking at Illinois as only halfway to meeting its enrollment goal,” said Naomi Lopez Bauman, director of health policy for the Illinois Policy Institute, a free-market think tank critical of the law.
Lopez Bauman was referring to a report released late Wednesday by House Republicans that showed just 52 percent of Illinoisans who selected policies
through the marketplace as of April 15 had paid their first month’s premium. The law’s proponents have dismissed the figures as incomplete and misleading.
Administration officials declined Thursday to say how many of the 8 million had paid, saying only that information should be available “later this year.”
But insurance industry officials have pegged the payment rate between 80 and 90 percent. If those percentages hold, the number of Americans who are fully enrolled in coverage through the marketplaces would be between 6.4 million and 7.2 million, in line with Congressional Budget Office projections.
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois, the dominant insurer in the state, said Thursday that 80 to 85 percent of its enrollees through April 15 have paid for their coverage.
The insurer, whose plan offerings on the Illinois exchange were among the least expensive, said it had signed up an estimated 200,000 consumers in Obamacare plans in the state, good for about 92 percent of the state’s total enrollment.
Blue Cross also enrolled about 150,000 others in health plans offered outside the exchange, said Greg Thompson, a spokesman.
Blue Cross’ haul left little for the five other carriers offering plans on the exchange, including Land of Lincoln Health, the startup insurer funded in part with a $160 million federal loan.
The nonprofit said Thursday that it had signed up just over 3,500 on its health plans in its first year of operation, far short of the 75,000 it had originally hoped to enroll.
“We are intensely focused on making sure (customers) receive the great customer service we promised and enhancing the benefits we offer in the years to come,” Land of Lincoln said in a statement.
Across the state, the majority of those who selected plans — about 56 percent — chose midlevel silver plans, while 29 percent selected lower-coverage bronze plans and 15 percent enrolled in more-expensive gold.
Through Wednesday, an additional 287,000 had enrolled in Medicaid, the state-federal health insurance for the low-income and disabled that Illinois and at least 25 other states opted to expand under the health law, according to state data.
State officials have said that as many as 350,000 could gain new Medicaid coverage by the end of 2014, far surpassing expectations.
“Certainly, the Medicaid numbers are great,” said David Elin, Illinois state director for Get Covered America, a health care enrollment group with close ties to the White House. “We’re thrilled, and we think this was a great first go-around. But the work is not done.”
Find the article here.
