by Wynton Hall
In an attempt to find a bright spot in the Obamacare debacle, Los Angeles Times writer Noam N. Levey published an article Monday stating that “enrollment is surging in many states as tens of thousands of consumers sign up for insurance plans made available by President Obama’s health law.”
Levey goes on to declare that several states have begun “outpacing their enrollment estimates” and are in some cases tripling enrollment rates: "In Minnesota, enrollment in the second half of October ran at triple the rate of the first half, officials said. Washington state is also on track to easily exceed its October enrollment figure, officials said."
Curiously missing from the article, however, were the actual baseline enrollment figures for states like Minnesota and Washington state whose sign-ups are "triple" and "on track to easily exceed" prior enrollment figures. Indeed, a careful analysis reveals the sad reality of the so-called “surge.”
Take Minnesota, for example. As Minnesota Public Radio reported in July, “no state is set to embrace the Affordable Care Act as thoroughly as Minnesota.” Even still, according to the Department of Health and Human Services’ own figures released last week, Minnesota has just 1,774 people who have “selected a Marketplace plan.” That means that if the LA Times story is accurate, Minnesota’s Obamacare enrollment “surge” resulted in just 5,322 more people signing up for Obamacare—and that from a state that was among the most enthusiastic and prepared for the health care overhaul.
As for the claim that “Washington state is also on track to easily exceed its October enrollment figure,” according to the Obama Administration, Washington enrolled just 7,091. Matching the same total the state hit during the abysmal first month of the rollout hardly seems worthy of being hailed a “surge.”
The Times also reported that in the first two weeks of November, California’s Obamacare exchange--“which accounted for a third of all enrollments nationally in October”--had “nearly doubled” the 31,000 people it enrolled last month. That figure represents a rather underwhelming improvement given the state’s size. Still, the story failed to report that according to California’s own insurance commissioner, over 1,000,000 Californians have already had their insurance canceled due to Obamacare.
Whatever next month’s Obamacare figures, they will pale in comparison to the at least 4,200,000 Americans who have already received insurance cancellation letters due to Obamacare.
Indeed, Obama promised no less than 36 times that if you like your insurance, you can keep it.
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Journalism/2013/11/19/LA-Times-Claims-Obamacare-Enrollments-Surging-Real-Numbers-Abysmal
