In Delaware, assuming 30,000 people enroll in private exchange policies by the end of January, I estimate around 20,000 of them would be forced off of their private policy upon an immediate-effect full ACA repeal, plus another 10,000 enrolled in the ACA Medicaid expansion program (PPT), for a total of 30,000 residents kicked to the curb.
As for the individual market, my standard methodology applies:
Insurance Commissioner Karen Weldin Stewart today released Delaware’s Qualified Health Plan average rates for Plan Year 2017.
The Commissioner recommended approval of a 32.5 % average rate increase in the individual market for Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield of Delaware. The approved average rate increase for the small group market for Highmark’s plans is 2.74%.
Aetna Life Insurance Company received an average of 22.8 % increase in the individual market and Aetna Health Insurance Company received an average increase of 23.6 %. In the small group market, Aetna Life received an average increase of 15.2 % and Aetna Health received an average increase of 19.7 %.
Delaware is a small state, and only has a total of 4 carriers offering individual polcies (2 on exchange, 2 off). One of those, however, is once again "Freedom Life" which, once again, is asking for precisely a 17.37% rate hike on their almost-certain-to-be-nonexistent enrollees. So...never mind them. That leaves Aetna (split into HMOs and PPOs) and Highmark BCBS offering policies on the exchange, and Golden Rule off the exchange.
Unfortunately, I can't find Golden Rule's actual current enrollment number, but as you can see below, it really doesn't matter:
As you can see, no matter how many enrollees Golden Rule has, their 30.3% average hike request is very close to the 30.6% average of the other carriers. The very most it could do is nudge the weighted average down by a tenth of a point or two, so let's call it 30.5%.
There's an old saying: Figures lie and liars figure. Statistics and percentages are a funny thing; as politicians of every stripe know, you can often twist them to mean whatever you like, especially when you don't provide proper (or sometimes any) context whatsoever. Case in point: Yesterday's embarrassingly dishonest "chart" presented by Representative Jason Chaffetz at the Planned Parenthood witchhunt committee hearing.
For a less inflamatory example of this, consider the headline of this entry:
Delaware: *Approved* 2016 rate hikes reduced by 11.4%!!
At first glance, of course, it looks like I'm saying that after going through the regulatory approval process, the individual health insurance premium rates in Delaware are being reduced by 11.4% next year! Hooray!
Delaware's 2016 rate hike analysis is about as simple and straightforward as it gets: Two companies (Aetna and Highmark BCBS) for both the individual and small group market, both on- and off-exchange, period...and their website includes the actual affected enrollee tallies for each, giving weighted totals:
Ugh. Nearly 25% requested for the individual market, just under 10% for the small group market. Of course these are requests only, so they might be slashed somewhat by regulators yet.
Tom Wolf, the newly-elected (Democratic) Governor of Pennsylvania, announced back in March that yes, he would absolutely push to "establish" a state ACA exchange in the event of a King plaintiff win, and earlier this week he made good on this by formally submitting an application to the HHS Dept.:
Pennsylvania became the first state Tuesday to publicly put in motion a back-up plan to protect its federal health insurance subsidies in the event the Supreme Court dismantles a key part of President Obama’s health care law.
State officials say they don't yet know how enrollment is going this year in Delaware's health insurance exchange.
The Delaware Health Care Commission received an update Thursday on the second year of implementation of the Affordable Care Act.
But state health and social services officials say won't be able report any enrollment numbers until they get them from the federal government. They say they hope to see the first monthly federal report around later this month.
I did receive these oddly-worded tidbits via Twitter:
More than 23,612 Delawareans have enrolled in a #ACA plan since October 2013#netDE
No 2015 data yet, but at least this has an update to the ACA Medicaid expansion figure for Delaware, tiny though it might be:
In addition to the Health Insurance Marketplace, some residents might be eligible for coverage through Delaware’s expanded Medicaid program, which continues year-round. More than 9,000 individuals have received coverage under the Medicaid expansion in the past year.
