Colorado: 29K QHPs in 22 days...and look at that, subsidized premiums DROP 1.9%!

Last week I estimated that the Colorado exchange had around 26.4K QHP selections in the first 22 days of OE4 based on some fuzzy extrapolation.

Today, the Connect for Health Colorado Finance & Operations Committee had a meeting with the following slideshow...showing that they're doing even better than that: 29,045 QHP selections in those same 22 days.

However, there's also another important tidbit here (last slide below): While the average unsubsidized premium rates for Colorado exchange enrollees officially went up 16.9%, the final premium cost to the enrollees is actually dropping by 1.9% (from $214/month to $210/month):

In Colorado, the typical consumer who has already used Affordable Care Act subsidies to buy exchange plan coverage for 2017 is on track to spend less on premiums next year.

...About 70 percent of the consumers who used the Colorado exchange to buy health coverage from Nov. 1 through Nov. 22 qualified for the ACA tax credit.

For those consumers, the ACA tax credit subsidy should cut the average net monthly cost of 2017 coverage to $210, or 1.9 percent less than the current average monthly cost, according to the exchange staff.

The full, unsubsidized monthly cost of the coverage will rise 17 percent to $533.