(AP) — After more than a week in action, is President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul a success or a bust? It’s hard to say because there’s hardly any data.
The federal government hasn’t released comprehensive data on how many people have signed up for health insurance in the 36 states using federally run exchanges, the online marketplaces for comparing and buying insurance.
Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Nebraska, which has about 50 Obamacare enrollees, said it had to stop enrollments from coming through automatically and hire temporary workers to contact customers to fix inaccuracies in submissions, according to the report.
In the 14 states running their own exchanges, it isn’t much better. For example, it’ll be mid-November before California says how many people signed up. In Oregon and Colorado, the official number is zero. In Minnesota, which embraced the Affordable Care Act, basic data won’t be released until next week.
As a result, a nation trying to determine winners and losers is finding it difficult to pass immediate judgment.