|
 The number represented a slight decline from the 2017 enrollment
figure when about 9.2 million people signed up for health insurance
policies from private insurers on the HealthCare.gov platform. It
was slightly lower than the 8.8 million figure given last week by
the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).
The revised figure was due to some late cancellations, CMS said.
Proponents of Obamacare, as former President Barack Obama's
healthcare law is known, said the 2018 figure was relatively strong
given President Donald Trump slashed the program's advertising and
outreach budget and cut the enrollment period in half.
Critics say the program is a failure as it is expensive and offers
few plan choices.
The figures represent individual plan selections for the 39
Exchanges that used HealthCare.gov during the enrollment period
which began on Nov. 1 and expired on Dec. 15.
[to top of second column] |
The deadline was extended to Dec. 31 in seven states affected by
storms, including Florida and Texas. The figures did not include
selections from state-based exchanges which do not use the
HealthCare.gov platform.
CMS said it would put out a final report in March including figures
from those states.
(Reporting by Toni Clarke in Washington; Editing by Andrew Hay)
[© 2017 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2017 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. |
