Obama Administration Boosted Obamacare Numbers With Dental Plans

2 minute read
Obamacare Expedited Bid Process Limited Who Could Build Website
Andrew Harrer—Bloomberg/Getty Images
By Eliana Dockterman

The Obama administration discreetly included dental plan sign-ups in its most recent report on the Affordable Care Act’s enrollment numbers.

The White House claimed in September that 7.3 million people had enrolled in insurance plans under Obamacare, surpassing President Obama’s 7 million sign-up goal. But investigators from the House Oversight and Government Committee analyzed these enrollments and found that as many as 400,000 of the plans were simply for dental coverage, Bloomberg reports. In earlier reports, the administration had counted dental plans separately.

Excluding dental plans, Obamacare enrollment would be around 6.7 million — missing the administration’s stated goal. The Department of Health and Human Services issued a statement Thursday calling the numbers a “mistake”:

A mistake was made in calculating the number of individuals with effectuated Marketplace enrollments. We have determined that individuals who had both Marketplace medical and dental coverage were erroneously counted in our recent announcements. The correct number of individuals with effectuated Marketplace medical coverage as of October 15 is approximately 6.7 million. Our target for 2015 open enrollment remains 9.1 million individuals. Moving forward only individuals with medical coverage will be included in our effectuated enrollment numbers.

U.S. Health and Human Service Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell called the error “unacceptable”

Burwell had perviously asserted that the success of Affordable Care Act should be measured by the U.S. uninsured rate, not the Obamacare enrollment numbers, which may fluctuate. The uninsured rate is down about four percentage points to 13.4% over the past year.

 

[Bloomberg]

More Must-Reads from TIME

Write to Eliana Dockterman at eliana.dockterman@time.com