Each day a few more pieces of the ObamaCare health insurance exchange puzzle are found in the box or underneath the couch or broken in half. A headline in a story appearing in the (very sympathetic) POLITICO catches the reader up: "Shutdown over, Congress turns to Obamacare 'train wreck.'"
Over the last two weeks, we already discussed some of the myriad of problems that go way beyond what was piously dismissed as "glitches": sticker shock (the same or lesser coverage will cost two or three times as much); the lowest price plans have gigantic deductibles; the obvious…misstatement… that people can keep their health plans, if they like them; the preposterous over-promising; and the simple fact that the meltdown was not primarily or even largely a function of demand—it was the system undergirding healthgov.org
Today we learn about not so much new flaws as an elaboration on some old ones and a few that are getting more attention. For example, as Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-Ga.) told POLITICO, "The databases that store sensitive medical and financial information aren't secure. [Over the next couple of months, because the potential for fraud is virtually limitless, there likely will be a flood of stories about consumers being ripped off.] "Worse still, these same individuals will be slapped with a penalty tax for being uninsured."
Which doesn't change the basic dilemma: people are still finding it near impossible to sign on, much less navigate healthgov.org. The irony is that in order to keep the public from panicking, everything the Obama administration has done to date is to remind "visitors" that many/most people can obtain insurance subsidies. But as the Washington Post reported this morning, trying to determine eligibility for subsidies is a nightmare.
Borrowing from Jim Geraghty over at National Review Online, quoting from other publications…
"Vermont has had 631 people sign up for insurance through its state-run Obamacare exchange as of Tuesday morning."
"According to a Washington Post report Wednesday morning, 59-year-old Janice Baker officially became the first confirmed enrollee in the Delaware Obamacare exchange that opened."
"A Wisconsin Reporter review of the insurers in Wisconsin's federally controlled Health Insurance Marketplace seems to confirm what the state Office of the Commissioner of Insurance told the MacIver News Service earlier this week: There has been "minimal participation" in the exchange to date. OCI estimated the number of people signed up was fewer than 50."
And, as the Washington Post noted today, "Hawaii's health insurance marketplace under President Barack Obama's federal health care overhaul began offering plans for sale on Tuesday, more than two weeks after the start of open enrollment."
And, as reminder of what we wrote earlier in the week, there was an incredible 88% drop in visitors between October 1 and October 13! While that is stunning enough, in the first week less than half of 1% of the visitors successfully enrolled, according to the Washington Post's Juliet Eilperin.
By Dave Andrusko, National Right to Life
