U.S.
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Beating expectations, President Barack Obama's health care overhaul was on track to sign up more than 7 million Americans for health insurance by the March 31 deadline, government officials told The Associated Press late Monday.
The goal, thought to be out of reach by most experts, was in sight on a day that saw surging consumer interest as well as vexing computer glitches that slowed sign-ups on the HealthCare.gov website.
Supporters of the health care law fanned out across the country in a final dash to sign up uninsured Americans for 2014. People not enrolled for health insurance by March 31, either through their jobs or on their own, are subject to fines from the IRS — a threat that helped drive enrollment.
In Louisiana, wait times for callers lasted up to two hours. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Tennessee received nearly 1,900 calls by midday, compared with about 800 the previous Monday. And in California, where enrollments surged toward the Obama administration's original projection of 1.3 million, deadline-day volume forced the state exchange to switch off a key function on its website and encourage people to finish their applications in the days ahead.
At times, more than 125,000 people were simultaneously using HealthCare.gov, straining it beyond its capacity. For long stretches Monday, applicants were shuttled to a virtual waiting room where they could leave an email address to be contacted later.
Officials said the site had not crashed but was experiencing very heavy volume. The website, which received 1.5 million visitors a day last week, had recorded about 1.6 million through 2 p.m. Eastern time on Monday.
The administration announced last week that people still in line by midnight Monday would get extra time to enroll.
The website stumbled early in the day and was out of service for nearly four hours as technicians patched a software bug. Another hiccup in the early afternoon temporarily kept new applicants from signing up, and then things slowed further.
Overwhelmed by computer problems when it launched last fall, the system has been working more smoothly in recent months, but independent testers say it still runs slowly.
"We admittedly had just a terrible start because the website wasn't working, and despite losing effectively two months, we are going to be reasonably close to that original projection," Obama said in a "CBS Evening News" interview that was taped last week and broadcast on Monday.
The insurance markets — or exchanges — offer private health insurance options to people who don't have access to coverage through their jobs. The federal government runs the exchanges in 36 states, while 14 other states and Washington, D.C., run their own markets.
New York, which runs its exchange, reported more than 812,000 people had signed up by Sunday morning — nearly 100,000 of them last week.
However, it's unclear what those numbers mean.
The Obama administration hasn't said how many of the 6 million people nationally who had signed up before the weekend closed the deal by paying the first month's premium.
Also unknown is how many previously had insurance. One of the main goals of the health care overhaul is to insure the previously uninsured.
In addition, the health law expands coverage for low-income people through Medicaid up to 133 percent of the federal poverty level, but only about half the states have agreed to implement that option. That has left a coverage gap for millions of Americans who are unable to get health care because they make too much to qualify for Medicaid but not enough to get federal subsidies to purchase insurance.
Although March 31 was the last official day to sign up for an insurance plan, millions of people may be eligible for extensions granted by the administration.
Those include people who began enrolling before the deadline but didn't finish, perhaps because of errors, missing information or website glitches. The government says it will accept paper applications until April 7 and take as much time as necessary to handle unfinished applications on HealthCare.gov. Rules may vary in states running their insurance marketplaces.
Those who still don't get health insurance run the risk that the IRS will fine them next year for remaining uninsured. It remains to be seen how aggressively the law will be enforced.
But the new markets don't have a monopoly on health insurance. People not already covered by an employer or a government program can comply with the insurance mandate by buying a policy directly from an insurer.
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