Looks like the glitches, gremlins, and guffaws are just about over; CMS reported today that enrollment via the exchanges is up to 4 million, an increase of some 700,000 over the last few weeks. That despite the ongoing efforts in some states to hinder enrollment, efforts which include outlawing “Navigators”, refusing to expand Medicaid, and prohibiting or barring various forms of consumer education.

Of course, there have been many, many stories of citizens disappointed/angered/furious with their new health plans.

There’s the one about the Michigan woman with cancer who has to pay more.  Oh, wait, she actually doesn’t; her new plan through Blue Cross Blue Shield cut her monthly premiums almost in half, from $1,100 to $571; that plus the annual-max-out-of-pocket pretty much assures her she’s fine after all.

Whew!

Well, then there’s the woman who claimed “Obamacare raped her future”!  Wow, such inflammatory language!  Especially for one so…uninformed.  Ashley Dionne said her costs would go up by a factor of four, but she didn’t realize she’d likely qualify for Medicaid, which would have cut her monthly premium to, well, nothing.

And who could forget Bette from Spokane! She was socked with a $700-a-month increase!  Uh, well, not…exactly.

Oops.  Turns out Bette never checked the exchange, could have got a much lower price, and the price she was quoted was for a waaaay better plan than the cheap one she had – and that’s why it was more costly.

Huh.  Well, what about those folks in Texas?  You know the one Maggie Mahar wrote about, the poor woman (why are they always women?  why don’t we men get to be victims?) with MS who had her policy canceled and the new one cost – gasp – $1000 a month! The couple with a $20,000 deductible! OUTRAGEOUS!!!

Well, that was not true.  First, no policy for a 27 year old will cost that much.  Next, there are NO $20,000 deductibles.  Finally, the paper that printed this crap never fact-checked the piece, and didn’t print a correction, and the reporter assigned the story was told to “To find people who [had insurance policies that] were cancelled – and having some difficulty.”

There are more horror stories.  But please, before you read and repeat, think.  Does it make sense?  Is it objective?  Who printed/produced it?

What does this mean for you?

Yes, there will be horror stories.

But none as horrible as 50 million of our fellow Americans not covered by insurance.

None as horrible as a loved one with breast cancer who can’t get care.

Now that’s horrible.

Amongst all the noise about the exchanges and enrollment, it is all-but-impossible to separate the BS from the RS  (real scoop).  So, here are a few factoids.

• Overall, enrollment for 2014 continues to lag behind initial projections,which the CBO estimated at 7 million last June, then lowered to 6 million this month.
• A recent analysis indicated some states’ active efforts to hinder enrollment are working, and are partly responsible for the shortfall in enrollment.
  Ed note – In those states, blaming the Administration for low enrollment while doing your best to prevent it yourself is like blaming your mom for your bad grades after you refused to study.
• As of Feb 1, 3.3 million have enrolled via the exchanges.
  • 55% are female
  • 27% are 18-34
  • 31% ar 55-64
  • 82% get some level of subsidy
• CMS may require health insurers selling via the federal exchanges to make sure at least 30 percent of “essential health providers” are in-network in 2015.  This in response to some complaints about networks that are allegedly too narrow.
  Ed note – Which is kind of ridiculous; smaller networks are better at controlling costs and that’s a BIG part of the success criteria for health reform.
• California’s website was recently down for five days due to software problems. Bad timing as a marketing push had just been rolled out.  Nonetheless, private insurers had enrolled about 829,000 members as of a week or so ago. About 86% of CA enrollees benefit from fedreal subsidies.
  • Anthem added 223,640 members
  • Blue Shield gained 213,6467
  • Kaiser increased by 131,448
• The flood of new enrollees are causing some delays in issuing ID cards, with Anthem among those “challenged”.
• Anecdotally, many of the new enrollees appear to be new to insurance as well.  This may indicate a substantial percentage of exchange enrollees were previously uninsured.  
• “Private” exchanges saw a big volume increase in late 2013 and that appears to be continuing into this year.

What’s the net?

Too early to tell.  Looks like things are going much better than late last year – but things were such a horror show that may be “damning with faint praise.”

We will have a much clearer picture in May, after the penalty period comes in to play, premium payment issues are straightened out, and most of the rest of the computer messes are cleaned up.