North Carolina

When UnitedHealthcare announced last month that they were making good on their threat last fall to pull out of the individual market in over two dozen states next year, it caused shockwaves across the health insurance industry. It is an important development, as around 800,000 people will be impacted.

When Humana announced last week that they plan on pulling out of the individual market in at least 5 states next year, it was interesting and a bit of a bummer, but not nearly as earthshattering, because only about 25,000 people will have to shop around and find a new carrier.

Today, it is my duty to announce that Celtic insurance has also decided to pull out of the entire individual insurance market (both on and off-exchange) across at least 6 states, including:

Ugh. Back in August I ran a ballpark estimate of the requested average rate hikes on the North Carolina individual market, and came up with 27% like so:

However, since then, 2 major NC insurers have revised their request upwards even further:

Two more health insurers in North Carolina are asking to increase their already-proposed rate increases. 

UnitedHealthcare, which had requested an average rate increase of 12.5 percent, now is asking regulators to allow an an average increase of 20.4 percent. The range is 2.5 percent to 50.3 percent.

Humana had requested 11.3 percent and is now asking for an average of 24.9 percent. 

IMPORTANT: See this detailed explanation of how I've come up with the following estimated maximum requested weighted average rate increases for this state.

As explained in the first link above, I've still been able to piece together rough estimates of the maximum possible and mid-range requested average rate increase for the North Carolina individual market:

BCBS of NC had previously requested an already-ugly 25.7% average rate hike, but has now asked to bump that up even more, to 34.6% overall.

Presented without comment:

North Carolinians could have three insurance carriers to choose from when enrollment under the Affordable Care Act reopens in November.

The state Department of Insurance has approved individual plans from UnitedHealthcare for the online marketplace, but they still need to be approved by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services because the federal government operates the exchange.

A quickie:

Insurance giant UnitedHealthcare this week became the third health insurer to propose selling federally subsidized health insurance in North Carolina, a move that would expand choice and increase competition here.

BCBSNC reports 232,000 QHPs sold on the ACA exchange...but that's out of about 273,000 total enrollees; they've removed the other 15% who haven't paid their premium yet:

The Blue Cross enrollments reflect insured customers who signed up from October through May 1 and are still paying premiums. About 15 percent of customers who signed up never paid a premium and are not included in the 232,000 figure, Burke said. 

So, fine: 85% for Blue Cross of NC. As it happens, NC sold a total of 357,584 policies total, which means BCBSNC sold over 76% of the total.

Now, it's conceivable (but not likely) that 100% of the remaining 84,500 enrollees snapped up by other companies did pay their premiums, but even so, that would only bring the paid percentage up to about 88.5%. So, I think it's safe to say that for North Carolina, 85% is a reasonable "How many have PAID???" figure for the full state until more solid numbers are released.

This number out of NC is a bit squirrelly; I'm not updating the actual spreadsheet with it, but it's still worth at least mentioning:

Overall, Terrell said, the state has received 95,000 Medicaid applications via the federal ACA sign-up, representing 132,000 people, since October 2013. And that number is likely to grow. 

The number of people added to Medicaid/CHIP in NC thru 3/01 via the HC.gov site was 55,691, so this could potentially be a more than 2.3x increase, but they're noted as applications, so presumably some of them will be denied. Still impressive.

(SIGH) OK, in the words of Emily Litella..."never mind..."

It looks like I was right to be suspicious of the seemingly fantastic QHP enrollment numbers reported out of both North Carolina and Louisiana.

Thanks to Jed Graham (via Twitter) for pointing me towards Page 21/22 of the February HHS Report. Normally I only focus on the 3rd and 4th columns ("Determined or Assessed Eligible for Medicaid / CHIP by the Marketplace" and "Number of 
Individuals Who Have Selected a Marketplace Plan", since these are the actual exchange enrollment numbers through the end of that month.

OK, I either have some very good news...or one heck of a misunderstanding here.

Earlier today I updated both New York and Colorado's QHP numbers...and while both were very fine, they were actually down somewhat from last week (large drop for NY, small one for CO). This may actually make sense, as both of these state exchanges have been running very smoothly for months now; it's possible that they've simply started to reach the end of the line in terms of residents actually signing up (or perhaps they'll both experience a final mini-surge right at the tail end this weekend).

However, the apparent news out of both North Carolina and Louisiana has me thrown for a heck of a loop (visit the links for details).

Good gravy. 391,000 people in North Carolina?? They were only at 200,546 as of 3/01. Even if you assume this number includes Medicaid enrollments, that's still only another 55,691 as of 3/01...and NC is not an expansion state. Assuming that 391K includes both...and assuming the same 78/22 split between the two...that still suggests that QHPs have gone up to around 305,000, a 105,115 increase over the end of February, and over 3.8x the February daily rate.

If it doesn't include Medicaid (which seems likely from the wording of the article), then it's a whopping 190,454 increase--a doubling of their 3/01 total, and a near 7x increase over February.

I find either of these rather difficult to believe, so for the moment I'm only entering it into this blog entry. If I can confirm the QHPs as either of these I'll change it tonight or tomorrow.