Michigan: ACA-enabled Medicaid hits 298K, or here's the difference between real journalism and my scribblings.

First, take a look at my most recent Michigan Medicaid expansion update from a week ago:

Michigan is now up to over 57% of the 500,000 residents eligible for Medicaid/CHIP under the Affordable Care Act:

Healthy Michigan Plan Enrollment Statistics

Beneficiaries with Healthy Michigan Plan Coverage: 287,281
(Includes beneficiaries enrolled in health plans and beneficiaries not required to enroll in a health plan.)

*Statistics as of June 9, 2014 
*Updated every Monday at 3 p.m.

That was it. That was the entire entry.

Next, for this week's update, take a look at Amy Lynn Smith's excellent piece on the same topic over at Eclectablog (this is the first time I know of that someone else has beaten me to the punch with a Michigan Medicaid update). Make sure to read the whole thing--it provides context, history, interviews, the ramifications; a full perspective:

Michigan’s Medicaid expansion program under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) didn’t launch until April 1, so uninsured Michiganders had to wait three extra months to enroll in the Healthy Michigan Plan. That’s because the Republican-led legislature didn’t give the law immediate effect, which would have allowed the program to launch January 1, 2014.

But people seeking insurance — and those helping people enroll — were undaunted. As of June 16, a total of 297,909 Michiganders had enrolled in the low-cost or free health insurance coverage available through the Healthy Michigan Plan, Michigan’s version of Medicaid expansion.