Dive Brief:
- Three big insurers -- Kaiser Permanente, Humana, and UnitedHealth Group -- have had the highest Medicare Advantage enrollment in the past two months. As of Dec. 1, 17.76 million seniors and disabled people have enrolled in a Medicare Advantage plan, a 6.8% increase from the same time frame in 2014.
- However, the 6.8% annual increase in enrollment was less than the 8% to 9% annual growth rate over the past five years, according to Modern Healthcare. More detailed information about whether fewer people are signing up for private plans or staying with traditional Medicare will become clearer next month when the data from December's enrollment is available.
- There were 24.27 million people with a Medicare Part D prescription drug plan as of Dec. 1, a 3.1% increase from last year, according to CMS. UnitedHealth, Humana, CVS Health, and Express Scripts Holding Co. hold 70% of the Part D market.
Dive Insight:
UnitedHealth has the most Medicare enrollees with 3.51 million members, according to Modern Healthcare's analysis of CMS data, with an additional 14,600 enrollees added the past two months. Humana enrolled 11,500 people into its Medicare Advantage products since October and Kaiser added 11,400 members. Cigna signed up 4,000 more people. However, Aetna added less than 1,300 Medicare members, including a loss of 410 members during November enrollment.
If the Aetna acquisition of Humana goes forward, the combined organization would be the largest Medicare Advantage company in the U.S. Aetna's CEO Mark Bertolini has stated the deal would not raise anti-competitive concerns since Medicare beneficiaries can switch to traditional Medicare, as reported by Modern Healthcare.