Affordable Care Act enrollment climbs to 4.2M in February, HHS reports

Total enrollment in private health-insurance plans through state and federal exchanges rose to more than 4.2 million as of March 1, the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) reported on March 11.

That’s up by 943,000 since Feb. 1, the agency said. The pace of sign-ups was below the 1.1 million registered in January and 1.8 million in December.

To meet the HHS’ original target of 7 million people enrolled in health plans under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) by the end of March, 2.8 million people would have to sign up for plans this month alone.

HHS also broke out its data by state. According to the numbers, 244,618 people had selected a private health-insurance plan from NY State of Health, the Empire State’s exchange, as of March 1.

However, the NY State of Health website (https://nystateofhealth.ny.gov) indicates that 590,639 individuals had enrolled in health plans as of March 10. Of those, 299,836 signed up for private insurance and 290,803 were eligible for Medicaid.

National numbers breakdown
Of the 4.2 million signed up for private health insurance as of March 1, 1.6 million were in state-run exchanges like New York and California, while 2.6 million were in the federally run exchange, the HHS said. The demographic breakdown or health-plan enrollees was as follows:

• 55 percent are female, 45 percent are male;
• 31 percent are age 34 and under;
• 25 percent are between the ages of 18 and 34;
• 63 percent selected a Silver plan, while 18 percent picked a Bronze plan; and,
• 83 percent selected a plan and are eligible to receive government subsidies

To read the full Department of Health & Human Services report on health-plan enrollment,  visit:http://aspe.hhs.gov/health/reports/2014/MarketPlaceEnrollment/Mar2014/ib_2014mar_enrollment.pdf