The Open Enrollment period to apply for health insurance plans through the Federal Marketplace opened Saturday and will run through Feb. 15. in more than a dozen states.
Gov. Terry McAuliffe kicked off the period, mandated by the Affordable Care Act, at an event Thursday in Richmond. He also unveiled a new user-friendly website, coverva.org. The site will assist qualified individuals with the registration for the plans and educate them about their options on healthcare.gov.
“Quality and affordable health care is a basic necessity for healthy families and a strong economy,” McAuliffe said in a press conference at the Vernon J. Harris Medical and Dental Center in Richmond. “My goal is to enroll up to 160,000 Virginians in affordable health coverage between now and Feb. 15. I want to make sure all Virginians who want help can get the in-person assistance they need to choose the right plans for themselves and their families.”
In conjunction with the open enrollment starting, Virginia has begun a series of outreach programs that will aim to promote affordable health care and guide individuals through the process. The state was recently awarded a $9.3 million federal grant to fund more than 100 enrollment assisters across the commonwealth, and an additional $4.3 million grant for additional outreach and educational programs.
Coverva.org will facilitate the purchase of individual health care plans by allowing people to find care located in and around their local communities.
“Virginia’s federally qualified health centers and the Virginia Poverty Law Center have long been valuable partners with state leaders in improving health care for Virginians,” said Bill Hazel, Virginia secretary of health and human resources. “I look forward to building on this great collaborative relationship. Together we will improve thousands of lives across the commonwealth.”
The Open Enrollment period begins just as the Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case challenging federal subsidies for states which did not expand Medicaid.
If the court decides that only state-run exchanges are allowed to receive subsidies, Virginians may not be able to enroll in health plans through the federal marketplace, as it has not expanded Medicaid.
“This would completely turn the law on its head,” said Carolyn Long Engelhard, director of health policy at the Medical School.
Engelhard said the individual mandate is essential to the Affordable Care Act, as it keeps costs down for everyone by enrolling relatively healthy people into insurance plans.
“It would be a pretty perfect storm leading to adverse selection in the insurance industry,” Engelhard said.
With this verdict, individuals in 36 states will no longer be able to purchase health care plans with a federal subsidy.
“This would essentially eliminate the individual mandate because the statute says that if the least expensive premium is more than eight percent of income one is exempt from the requirement to purchase it,” Engelhard said.
Adverse selection refers to what happens when the only people purchasing insurance plans are the people most likely to use lots of health care, which causes a hike in premiums. If the court overturns the current federal subsidy system, then five out of the eight million people who enrolled in the first year of the Affordable Care Act, through the state or federal government, would be ineligible for federal subsidies.
Last year, 216,000 Virginians purchased health care plans during the open enrollment period, which was marred with technical difficulties on the healthcare.gov website. Another 300,000 state residents qualify for tax credits on the Marketplace but remain uninsured.
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