NOTE: Given how much the national pace of vaccination shots has slowed down recently (the 7-day average is down to around ~330,000/day), going forward this will be a MONTHLY update, unless the pace picks up again significantly.

Methodology reminders:

• I go by county residents who have received the 2nd COVID-19 shot only (or 1st in the case of the J&J vaccine).

• I base my percentages on the total population via the 2020 U.S. Census as opposed to adults only or those over 11 years old (or even over 4 years old).

• For most states + DC I use the daily data from the Centers for Disease Control, but there are some where the CDC is either missing county-level data entirely or where the CDC data is less than 90% complete at the county level. Therefore:
  • For Vermont , Virginia and West Virginia, I'm using data from the COVID Act Now Risk & Vaccine Tracker database

Via the Federal Register:

Section 673(2) of the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (OBRA) of 1981 (42 U.S.C. 9902(2)) requires the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services to update the poverty guidelines at least annually, adjusting them on the basis of the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U). The poverty guidelines are used as an eligibility criterion by Medicaid and a number of other Federal programs.

The poverty guidelines issued here are a simplified version of the poverty thresholds that the Census Bureau uses to prepare its estimates of the number of individuals and families in poverty.

As required by law, this update is accomplished by increasing the latest published Census Bureau poverty thresholds by the relevant percentage change in the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U). The guidelines in this 2022 notice reflect the 4.7 percent price increase between calendar years 2020 and 2021.

Yesterday I did a write-up about Covered California's 2022 Open Enrollment Period Executive Summary, which included a bunch of important data and demographic breakouts about how the largest state-based ACA exchange performed over the 2022 OEP.

However, I deliberately left out a section because I wanted to discuss it separately. If you scroll down to pages 31 & 32, you'll see a summary of two important pieces of ACA-related legislation which have been introduced in the California state legislature.

One of these is SB 967, introduced by CA State Senator Robert Hertzberg, which would do the following:

Hmmmm...a few weeks ago I posted a press release from Covered California which seemed to indicate that total 2022 Open Enrollment Period (OEP) plan selections had broken 1.8 million people.

Today I was directed to Covered CA's official 2022 OEP Executive Summary report, and it turns out the final numbers were a bit lower than that...but still record-breaking and impressive:

AMERICAN RESCUE PLAN LEADS TO HISTORIC OPEN ENROLLMENT

This just in via the New Jersey Dept. of Banking & Insurance:

Governor Murphy and DOBI Commissioner Caride Announce Record Health Insurance Sign-Ups During Open Enrollment, Introduce Effort to Further Expand Health Care Access for NJ Residents  

• New Jersey Residents at Certain Incomes Can Now Enroll Year-Round In Free or Nearly Free Coverage

• Residents with a Qualifying Life Event Also Have Options to Get Covered 

TRENTON – Governor Phil Murphy and Department of Banking and Insurance Commissioner Marlene Caride today announced more than 324,000 New Jerseyans signed up for health coverage through Get Covered New Jersey during the Affordable Care Act Open Enrollment Period –  an increase of 20 percent compared to last year – and a record high in New Jersey, as residents benefited from increased affordability from expanded federal and state financial help.

Last summer, I pulled together the occasional vaccination rate scatter plot graphs I'd been compiling for months into a single animated GIF image to show how both the correlation (R^2) and steepness (slope) of the partisan COVID vaccination divide grew from almost nothing at all to a gaping chasm over a six month period, from February 2021 through August 2021.

Today, I'm presenting an updated version of this animation which not only includes the following six months as well (September 2021 - February 2022), but also cleans up & standardizes the layout of each graph as much as possible. This includes making sure the thru date is in the upper right-hand corner on all of them, moving the population key to the lower-right corner, removing the (naive in retrospect) "herd immunity target" line, and moving the R^2 stamp immediately below the thru date to make the graph itself as clean as possible.

For months I posted weekly looks at the rate of COVID-19 cases & deaths at the county level since the end of June, broken out by partisan lean (i.e, what percent of the vote Donald Trump received in 2020), as well as by the vaccination rate of each county in the U.S. (nonpartisan).

This basically amounts to the point when the Delta Variant wave hit the U.S., although it had been quietly spreading under the radar for a few months prior to that.

Now that we're a full two months into the Omicron Variant wave, I've updated my case/death rate tracking to reflect that as well...because the data so far is showing a completely new chapter as we enter the 3rd year of the Coronavirus Pandemic.

As always, here's my methodology:

Methodology reminders:

• I go by county residents who have received the 2nd COVID-19 shot only (or 1st in the case of the J&J vaccine).
  • Note: I've temporarily stopped tracking boosters again, as it appears that the data on this front is still too confused to get an accurate county-level national read.

• I base my percentages on the total population via the 2020 U.S. Census as opposed to adults only or those over 11 years old (or even over 4 years old).

• For most states + DC I use the daily data from the Centers for Disease Control, but there are some where the CDC is either missing county-level data entirely or where the CDC data is less than 90% complete at the county level. Therefore:
  • For Vermont and West Virginia, I'm using data from the COVID Act Now Risk & Vaccine Tracker database
  • For Virginia, I'm using the official state health department dashboard, but am only updating it once a month since it doesn't allow you to export, view or download all 95 counties/city-counties at once, making this a tedious effort.

This is potentially a pretty big deal:

As part of the Biden-Harris Administration’s work to advance health equity and reduce health disparities, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is seeking feedback on topics related to health care access, such as enrolling in and maintaining coverage, accessing health care services and supports, and ensuring adequate provider payment rates to encourage provider availability and quality. This Request for Information (RFI) is one of many actions CMS is taking to develop a more comprehensive access strategy in its Medicaid and CHIP programs.

“We are committed to providing equitable access to quality health care and removing any barriers to quality health care,” said Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra. “We want to hear directly from stakeholders so we can strengthen our programs for the more than 80 million Americans with Medicaid or CHIP health insurance. Together, by advancing health equity, we can ensure quality health care is within reach for everyone who needs it.” 

Last month I noted that a press release from New York State of Health (NY's ACA exchange) was kind of oddly worded:

...several paragraphs later, you get this:

...Extending the Open Enrollment Period for QHP’s aligns with the coverage rules for public programs also administered through NY State of Health. New Yorkers need to enroll by January 15 for coverage starting February 1 and by February 15 for coverage starting March 1.

In other words, they've bumped out the final deadline by another 2 weeks, through 2/15. Why this isn't mentioned until 5 paragraphs in, I have no idea, but whatever.

At the time, I assumed that they had extended their 2022 Open Enrollment Period deadline through February 15th, as I didn't see any other press releases clarifying things.

Well, it turns out they did extend it, but not through any specific date: