Massachusetts: 179.5K *effectuated* enrollees & a whole mess of other data
The Massachusetts Health Connector held their monthly board meeting last week and have released their September dashboard report with a whole mess of demographic data for Baystate-obsessed nerds to revel in.
I've pasted screen shots of every page of the report below, but here's the main takeaways:
- Effectuated QHPs have reached 179,470 enrollees...a whopping 38.930 higher (28%) than at the end of Open Enrollment.
While the national effectuation number is likely around 3% lower today than it was in March (9.9 million vs. 10.2 million), in Massachusetts it's 45% higher. There's two main reasons for this, both connected to "ConnectorCare", which is unique to Massachusetts. ConnectorCare consists of the same low-end Qualified Health Plans that anyone can purchase (ie, they're still counted as QHPs in the national tally), except that in addition to the federal Advanced Premium Tax Credits (APTC), enrollees in ConnectorCare also receive additional state-based financial assistance, making them even more attractive to enrollees. In addition, however, unlike "normal" APTC or Full Price QHPs, which are limited to the official open enrollment period for most people, ConnectorCare enrollment, like Medicaid/CHIP, is open year round. That makes a dramatic difference, as you can see below; the vast bulk of the net QHP enrollment increase since March is thanks to ConnectorCare additions.
- In addition, MA is the only state I know of which actively reports their attrition numbers--that is, so far this year they've had just 17,246 people drop their QHP policies, meaning a total of 196,716 people have selected a plan and paid at least their first monthly premium.
- Assuming a 90% payment rate (confirmed for Massachusetts back in April), this also suggests that the cumulative QHP selection total should be roughly 218,000 people to date, which is only significant to me and The Graph.
But wait, there's more! Look below and you'll see a whole mess of pie charts, bar charts and line charts, breaking out everything from Metal Level selections and Market Share by Provider to SHOP enrollments (5,562 lives covered as of October 1st) and even Dental Plans!
Data nerds, go nuts!!