By Kerry Young, CQ Roll Call
February 4, 2015 - With almost 10 million people already slated to get insurance through federal and state marketplaces, Obama administration officials urged Americans who have not yet arranged their medical coverage for 2015 to do so ahead of a Feb. 15 deadline for health law enrollment.
"There is still time to sign up but the clock is ticking," Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell said on a recent call with reporters.
Earlier in the day, Burwell told the Senate Finance Committee that almost 7.5 million consumers had selected a plan or were automatically enrolled through the federal exchange healthcare.gov, while another 2.4 million had come into the system through state exchanges.
Burwell had some weeks back set the bar low for enrollment expectations, saying her goal was that at least 9.1 million people would enroll and pay their premiums early this year. That includes data from states that run their own enrollment websites.
The 7.5 million people who have signed up through the federal marketplace alone is up from a total of almost 7.3 million through the week of Jan. 23. HHS officials release a weekly snapshot of enrollment through healthcare.gov, which enrolls people in 37 states.
Among the regions with the greatest activity in recent weeks on the federal marketplace have been the greater Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach area of Florida, with more than 630,000 plans selected, and metro Atlanta, with almost 300,000, HHS said in a recent statement. About 87 percent of the people who have signed up so far through the healthcare.gov site have qualified for financial assistance, Burwell said.