The federal government plans to use a new advertising campaign to boost enrollment in public marketplaces under the Affordable Care Act, The New York Times reports.
President Barack Obama's administration is looking at an advertising campaign featuring testimonials from newly insured consumers, along with direct appeals to young adults who faced tax penalties this year for failing to enroll, according to the report.
The push for enrollment comes as some of the large insurers say they will leave or scale back from online insurance exchanges. Aetna, which is in the process of a pending merger with Humana, has said it will pull out of ACA exchanges in 11 states next year, citing $430 million in losses incurred on individual plans since January 2014.
UnitedHealthcare and Humana also said they will, for the most part, exit ACA marketplaces next year.
Anthem, which is looking to acquire Cigna, said its losses also had been increasing, but that it does not plan to leave the marketplaces, according to the report. The U.S. Department of Justice and attorneys general from several states filed lawsuits against Anthem and Aetna out of concern their proposed acquisitions would impede health insurance competition. Anthem operates for-profit Blue Cross plans in 14 states and said it can't expand to other states unless the merger with Cigna goes goes through, The New York Times reports.
This is all occurring less than three months before the fourth annual open ACA enrollment period is set to begin Nov. 1.
This time around, federal officials said they would try to sign up more young adults, particularly those turning 26 and moving off their parents' plans, according to the report. Federal officials said they would also, for the first time, send letters about marketplace coverage to people who were hit with the tax penalty for being uninsured, the report states.
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