In 2014, just 106,000 people enrolled in Obamacare in the first month, but this year in the first week of open enrollment, HealthCare.gov and its Spanish-language counterpart CiudadodeSalud.gov signed up 462,125 people, according to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) blog. (Unofficially, by the end of week two, the number had risen to about 1.04 million federal sign-ups.)
The DOL-issued first-week figure covers Nov. 15 to Nov. 21. The federal site now enrolls people from 36 states after Oregon and Nevada shut down their state exchanges due to various difficulties. The total does not include results from the 14 states still operating their own marketplaces.
“Today, we are releasing the first weekly snapshot of Federal Marketplace Open Enrollment activity; we had a solid start, but we have a lot of work to do every day between now and February 15,” HHS Secretary Sylvia Burwell said. “People are ready to get covered, and visitors to HealthCare.gov are seeing more competition, affordable options and an improved consumer experience.”
A chart on the blog post indicates that 48 percent of the enrollees were new consumers, while 52 percent were consumers renewing their policies.
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