Maryland: QHPs up 6,700 since end of May; Medicaid up 32K

Until this month, Maryland's reports were a bit irritating in two ways: First, they were running a month behind; second, the "thru dates" for the QHP numbers never quite lined up with the Medicaid number for some reason. With today's report, they've corrected both issues, bundling both June and most of July in and matching up the dates:

Enrollment Data
As of July 26, 2014, 332,504 individuals have gained Medicaid coverage in 2014 and remain active in Medicaid. This includes the 95,889 PAC enrollees who were automatically converted on January 1, 2014 to full Medicaid coverage.

Beginning this month, we will also report net changes in Medicaid enrollment. This figure takes into account the fact individuals lose Medicaid coverage because of changes in household, age, and income, as well as redeterminations. Compared to December 31, 2013, the net change in Medicaid enrollment as of July 26, 2014 is +273,245.

As of July 26, 78,930 individuals have enrolled in a qualified health plan.

Another nice touch: They're specifically reporting the net change in Medicaid enrollment, which is a good thing since it shows the impact of "churn" on enrollment (at least on the Medicaid side). The total added to Medicaid since the beginning of the year is 332.5K, but the net increase is 273.2K, which means that 59,000 people moved off of Medicaid even as 332K moved onto it. Nothing wrong with this, since those 59K presumably saw better fortunes as their situation improved, turned 65 and thus now qualify for Medicare instead and so on (of course in a few cases, they presumably died...hey, it happens to everyone at some point...)

Meanwhile, the QHP tally is actually quite impressive, especially given MD's technical woes. They've now added well over 11,000 people since the end of open enrollment, or 33% the daily rate (which is higher than the average for most states, which seems to be hovering between 20 - 25% of the open enrollment rate).