WASHINGTON — A record 16.3 million people sought health insurance through the Affordable Care Act this year, double the amount covered when the market first launched nearly a decade ago. , the Biden administration announced Wednesday.
According to the Department of Health and Human Services, more than 3 million new members have entered the market, also known as “Obamacare”.
The government has been working with nonprofit groups and investing in program specialists who have helped enroll people, said Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. from low-income, immigrant, Black and Latino communities to enroll more people.
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“We have made an unprecedented investment to expand the reach of our admissions organization to nearly every county in the country and target the hardest-to-reach communities,” she said.
Enrollment is up as the number of uninsured is at an all-time low — just 8% of people in the United States remain uninsured.
President Joe Biden and the Democratic-led Congress have committed millions of dollars over the past two years to open up low-cost insurance programs to more people and ban states from evicting people from Medicaid. during the COVID-19 pandemic. The market itself has also grown in recent years, with more insurance companies participating, giving the vast majority of Americans at least three plans to consider when signing up.
Those coverage pauses were extended to 2025 under a major health care and climate bill backed by Democrats last year.
Some of that progress is at stake this year, with millions expected to lose Medicaid coverage starting this spring as states begin the process of phasing out those who are no longer eligible. , in many cases because their income is currently too high to qualify.
Some people who will lose Medicaid are expected to move to the market, and the administration says it is spending $12 million to keep information specialists working in the coming months to help people apply to the market. health law if they lose Medicaid coverage.
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