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  1. #1
    Senior Member JohnDoe2's Avatar
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    House passes bill requiring health care numbers

    House passes bill requiring health care numbers

    By DONNA CASSATA 4 hours ago


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    House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio meets with reporters on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Jan. 16, 2014. On Wednesday, the Republican-run House passed an immense $1.1 trillion spending package, a bipartisan compromise that all but banishes the likelihood of an election-year government shutdown. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

    WASHINGTON (AP) — The House on Thursday backed a bill that would require the Obama administration to report weekly on how many Americans have signed up for health care coverage as Republicans maintain an election-year spotlight on the troubled law.

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    The vote was 259-154, with 33 Democrats breaking ranks and joining the GOP majority in supporting the legislation. It marked the second time in a week — and certainly not the last — that the House has targeted President Barack Obama's law, with Republicans confident that Americans' unease with the overhaul will produce major GOP wins in the November elections.
    Some of the most vulnerable Democrats facing re-election this fall from Arizona, Georgia, New York and Florida voted for the bill. Last week, 67 Democrats bucked the administration and backed a bill to bolt new security requirements on the law.

    The bill would require the administration to report weekly on the number of visits to the government health care website, the number of Americans who applied and the number of enrollees by ZIP code, as well as other statistics. It stands no chance in the Democratic-led Senate.


    The administration has reported monthly on enrollment, announcing last week that 2.2 million signed up through the end of December and nearly 4 million had been deemed eligible for Medicaid.


    Those reports are insufficient, Republicans argued.


    "We know the president's health care law is driving up costs for middle-class families, making it harder for small businesses to hire, and hurting the economy - but there's still a lot we don't know," said House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, contending that the administration "hasn't provided a clear picture of where enrollment stands."


    Democrats countered that the Republicans were adding onerous requests and disrupting administration efforts to sign up millions of Americans for health care coverage.


    "This is just an attempt to pile on so many requirements on the administration," said Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., who pointed to recent administration reports. He said the data disclosed is consistent with what the government releases monthly on Medicare.


    Obama has said his administration is the most transparent in history, and Republicans tossed those words back at him.


    "This bill is fundamentally about transparency," said Rep. Joe Pitts, R-Pa., who insisted that the American people have a right to an accurate assessment of the law's data.


    The administration opposes the measure, saying it has been providing information on enrollments and the added requirements would force it to hire new staff as government expense.


    Democratic Rep. John Sarbanes, D-Md., said the measure was "really designed to harass the Health and Human Services" Department.


    The goal of the Affordable Care Act is to expand coverage to tens of millions of Americans who lack insurance, to lower health care costs, to increase access to preventive services and to eliminate some of the pre-existing condition requirements that insurance companies have used to deny coverage.

    The health care website got off to a calamitous start on Oct. 1, followed quickly by widespread reports of canceled policies and higher premiums.


    Republicans who steadfastly opposed the law have led the charge in the House, which voted more than 40 times last year to repeal, replace or undo parts of the law. The GOP campaigned last year on a promise to repeal and replace the law, but the party hasn't offered an alternative.


    Boehner said Republicans will hold their annual retreat in another week and a half, and health care is on the agenda.


    "I think you'll see Republicans come forward with a plan to replace 'Obamacare,' a plan that will actually reduce costs for the American people and make health insurance more accessible," Boehner told reporters at a news conference.


    http://news.yahoo.com/house-passes-b...-politics.html
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  2. #2
    Senior Member JohnDoe2's Avatar
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    118,000 Texans use federal website for health care

    More than 118,000 Texans signed up for health insurance using federal HealthCare.gov

    January 14, 2014 10:10 AM

    http://news.yahoo.com/118-000-texans...151008410.html
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    Senior Member JohnDoe2's Avatar
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    1. 75000 Mich. residents choose health insurance
      MiamiHerald.com ‎- 3 days ago
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    Senior Member JohnDoe2's Avatar
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    Senior Member JohnDoe2's Avatar
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    1. Pa., N.J., Del. below average on health care sign-ups — NewsWorks

      www.newsworks.org/.../health.../63935-pa-nj-del-below-average-on-health...
      1 day ago - The state health care exchanges under the Affordable Care Act have been signing up a lot more people in the last month following serious ...
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    Obamacare 'surge' persists into 2014 in some states


    By Sharon Begley January 15, 2014 5:53 PM

    .
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    Engrith Acosta, patient care coordinator at AltaMed, speaks to a man during a community outreach on Obamacare …


    By Sharon Begley

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    NEW YORK (Reuters) - The late-December surge that pushed enrollment in private health insurance plans under Obamacare past 2.1 million people continued into 2014, officials of several state-run insurance marketplaces said on Wednesday.

    It was encouraging news for White House hopes of signing up 7 million Americans by March 31, the deadline for 2014 coverage under President Barack Obama's healthcare law.


    That goal has appeared elusive due to the disastrous performance of HealthCare.gov, the federal enrollment portal through which Americans in 36 states sign up to buy health insurance, in October and November, even as the websites of many of the 15 state-run exchanges fared better.


    The Washington Health Benefit Exchange has had about 8,000 enrollments in private health plans since late December, bringing the total to just over 73,000. "We doubled our call-center staff in December" to handle the end-of-year surge, said Richard K. Onizuka, chief executive of the exchange, in a conference call arranged by the nonprofit healthcare advocacy group Families USA. "And now we're almost doubling it again."


    The deadline is Wednesday for coverage that starts on February 1. For coverage that begins on March 1, consumers must enroll by February 15.

    Those who do not have insurance must enroll by March 31 or incur a tax penalty.


    Kentucky, whose Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear has been an enthusiastic supporter of Obama's Affordable Care Act, has been logging about 2,000 simultaneous users on its website in January, said Carrie Banahan, executive director of the Kentucky Health Benefit Exchange. That compares with 600 before the December surge, when "Kynect" topped 33,000 enrollments in private health insurance. Banahan did not release January enrollment figures.


    Connecticut enrolled about 36,000 people in private health plans through late December, spokeswoman Kathleen Tallarita said. Since then it has enrolled "in some cases, 500 to 1,000 in a week," which would put it behind 2013's pace. The state will release January enrollment figures on Thursday.


    New York also "is seeing an increase in call volume as we approach today's deadline," said Danielle Hollihan, deputy director of New York State of Health, referring to the January 15 cut-off for coverage beginning February 1.

    New York has been enrolling about 7,000 people per day in private plans and Medicaid in January, she said, compared with a total of about 230,000 from October 1 through late December.


    California, whose 500,000 private-plan enrollments through December lead all states, has not released January numbers, but said it continued "to see a tremendous amount of interest."


    Data on sign-up activity for HealthCare.gov in the last two weeks was not available.


    Virtually every state is trying to pump up enrollment by young adults, since those aged 18 to 34 so far account for only 24 percent of enrollees nationwide, the Obama administration announced on Monday.


    The program needs a higher proportion of younger members, who tend to be healthier and, therefore, less likely to need the costliest medical care, to offset expenses for sicker beneficiaries.


    On Thursday, Covered California will hold a six-hour extravaganza at YouTube studios in Los Angeles, with a live broadcast of what it calls "a range of viral entertainment geared toward millennials about the importance of getting covered."


    http://news.yahoo.com/obamacare-39-s...225045327.html
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  7. #7
    Senior Member JohnDoe2's Avatar
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    Calif. officials: Obamacare enrollment surges in new year

    By Tom Howell Jr. - The Washington Times
    January 21, 2014, 02:04PM




    • FILE - In this Nov. 13, 2013 file photo, Peter Lee, executive



    More than 625,000 people have enrolled in private health insurance through California’s Obamacare market as of mid-month, an uptick from the half-million enrollees reported through the end of last year, officials for Covered California said Tuesday.

    Officials said 500,108 had enrolled on the state-run health exchange from Oct. 1 to Dec. 31, but preliminary data suggests that an additional 125,000 had enrolled through Wednesday.
    Additionally, 584,000 applications have been deemed eligible for Medi-Cal, the state’s Medicaid program, officials said.

    “We’re encouraged by the outpouring of interest and participation in the state insurance exchange,” said Covered California Executive Director Peter V. Lee.

    Federal health officials reported last week that nearly 2.2 million Americans had enrolled in private plans through Obamacare marketplaces through Dec. 28, meaning California contributed nearly a quarter of all enrollees.

    California is by far the nation’s most populous state and, in 2010, was the first to lay the legislative groundwork for a state-run exchange under Obamacare.

    The California exchange reported that 25 percent of its private-plan enrollees fall into the 18-34 age group, a key demographic for making Obamacare’s economics work.

    Younger people tend to be healthier, so they would keep premiums in check when older consumers with people with preexisting conditions enroll on state-based marketplaces set up under the Affordable Care Act.

    Experts say nationwide enrollment among 18- to 34-year-olds should be closer to 40 percent to keep premiums from rising.

    Covered California said the 18-34 group represents about 25 percent of the state’s population but about 36 percent of those who are eligible for government subsidies on the exchange to defray the costs of health premiums


    Read more: http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/...#ixzz2r5UvIkYg
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