Citing the pandemic, the Biden administration says it will open a special enrollment period (SEP) for Affordable Care Act exchange plans through May 15, 2021.
"Due to the exceptional circumstances and rapidly changing Public Health Emergency (PHE) impacting millions of people throughout the U.S. every day," CMS said in a
Jan. 28 announcement, "many Americans remain uninsured or underinsured and still need affordable health coverage."
To remedy the situation, and in accordance with an
Executive Order issued the same day by President Biden, CMS says it will open the SEP on February 15 "in the 36 states served by Marketplaces that use the HealthCare.gov platform... CMS strongly encourages states operating their own Marketplace platforms to make a similar enrollment opportunity available to consumers in their states."
CMS will also devote $50 million to "outreach and education," using "a mix of tactics to increase awareness, including advertisements on broadcast, digital, and an earned media" to notify potential enrollees.
"As always," the agency added, "consumers found eligible for Medicaid or CHIP will be transferred to their state Medicaid and CHIP agencies for enrollment in those programs."
A
December Health Affairs analysis by Katie Keith found that "Overall enrollment [in ACA plans] through HealthCare.gov increased by about 6.6 percent for the 2021 open enrollment period relative to the 2020 open enrollment period," constituting the first enrollment increase since the beginning of the ACA-unfriendly Trump administration.