Dive Brief:
- Close to 300,000 people stopped paying their premiums obtained via state exchanges and HealthCare.gov in the second quarter of this year. At the end of June, 9.9 million consumers had active coverage, down from 10.2 million in March.
- CMS said it is above the target enrollment of 9.1 million for the end of this year.
- According to the Washington Post, congressional budget analysts estimate 21 million consumers will have health coverage through the exchanges - more than double the current enrollment.
Dive Insight:
Despite the initial high enrollment via exchanges when 7 million Americans signed up, there was no information about how many people had paid at least their first-month premium. The figures discussed above are the first update.
According to the Washington Post, declining enrollment through exchanges may be because consumers didn't begin to pay for their plan or stopped paying shortly after enrollment. Another reason may be they may no longer need coverage because they received health coverage via a job or joined Medicaid or Medicare. Elizabeth Carpenter, Vice President of Avalere Health, a consulting firm, asked: "Are people continuing to be able to afford insurance, and are they seeing value in their coverage? That is a big question for exchanges long-term."