White House Tight-Lipped on Obamacare Demographics

The White House is unable "at this time" to release data on the numbers of younger, healthy people enrolling in Obamacare, according to The Hill.

 

These figures matter because for the plan to be demographically viable and cost-efficient, a certain number of young and healthy people — maybe 4 out of 10 enrollees, according to some experts — would need to register.

Editor’s Note: New 'Obamacare Survival Guide' Reveals Dangers Ahead for Your Healthcare
 

This younger group would make up for the cost of insuring older and less healthy Americans so that premiums do not spike in the coming years.

The administration says that the demographic figures will be released when on hand.

"If you look at how we've dealt with data as it's become available over the past several months, both good data and bad data, we've done our best to provide it to you when we are confident about the accuracy of it," White House press secretary Jay Carney said.

Meanwhile, Carney said the administration was not bound by a Congressional Budget Office estimate that 7 million individuals would likely enroll for insurance on the healthcare exchanges during 2014.

That figure had been mentioned as a yardstick for "success" by senior officials, including Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, according to the Hill.

Carney said: "It's important to understand that it is not — that there's not some magic number: 6,999,999 and the system collapses; one more than that and it functions perfectly. We're not backing away from a number that we didn't put out originally."

"I think that others noted that 7 million is a fine target, but that will not determine whether the marketplaces function effectively," said Carney.
 

 

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