Washington State: Total individual market grows 47K since September

Washington State is doing a fantastic job of tracking pretty much every data point about health insurance in the state (I already had the 146K number):

OLYMPIA, Wash. – The individual health insurance market has grown to more than 324,900 people in Washington state, according to updated enrollment information reported by health insurers to the Office of the Insurance Commissioner this week.

This number includes 178,981 enrolled outside the Exchange and 146,000 enrolled inside the Exchange, Washington Healthplanfinder, as of March 31. The total is expected to increase as late enrollments through the Exchange are processed and reconciled.

...Before open enrollment began on Oct. 1, 2013, approximately 278,000 people were enrolled in health plans in Washington state’s individual market. Some 238,000 people received discontinuation notices from their insurers and had to find new coverage by Jan. 1, 2014. Estimates were made earlier this year that 113,000 of those who received notices would qualify for subsidies and 30,000 would qualify for the state’s newly expanded Medicaid program, Apple Health.

No information is available on how many of the 324,981 people who are newly enrolled previously had coverage or how many had to find new coverage because their old plans were discontinued.

Kreidler’s office sent a follow-up data request to the health insurers yesterday requesting specific demographic information and a breakdown of individual plan enrollment by county both inside and outside the Exchange. This information will be released next month.

Interestingly, the 178K off-exchange QHP figure is actually down a bit from the Jan. 31st total of 184K, but presumably that's due to normal churn (people moving, losing/changing jobs, etc).

What this does tell us is that there's been net gain of 47,000 people to WA's individual market since last fall.