A remarkable and rather unheralded development is quietly taking place regarding the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) health overhaul. Enrollments are surging now, particularly in the 14 states running their own exchanges. The Buffalo News reports that the Empire State signed up 48,162 last week, about half of whom bought insurance on the exchange while the other half signed up for the expanded Medicaid eligibility. Connecticut is on track and about 14% of the way to their enrollment goals for the March 31 deadline.
Covered California has signed up 59,000 for the private exchanges and added 72,000 to Medicaid. The Golden State is adding another 2,000 people a day to its rolls. Covered Oregon "cut its uninsured population by 10 percent in the first six weeks of enrollment." The Los Angeles Times reports rapidly accelerating momentum. "California — which enrolled about 31,000 people in health plans last
month — nearly doubled that in the first two weeks of this month." "What we are seeing is incredible momentum," said Peter Lee, director of Covered California.
The effects of state cooperation have been important. To give you an idea, Kentucky is the only southern venue in which the state government has supported the program. 5,586 Kentuckians have signed up for insurance there. Meanwhile, 2,921, about half as many, have signed up in Texas, even though Texas has six times Kentucky's population.
Nationwide,about 400,000 people have been added to Medicaid and about half that many have secured private insurance coverage through ACA. Despite the rocky federal website roll out, as things continue to improve the country is rapidly reaching a tipping point. Before long there will be a million people directly helped by Obamacare. As the detractors have feared all along, once that happens they will never be able to get rid of it. It will prove as politically impossible for them to repeal the program and take coverage away from people as it has been for them to repeal Social Security or Medicare.
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