A government survey has shown that the growth rate within that market dropped significantly in 2016.
A federal report has confirmed that the health insurance market growth rate is slowing down. In fact, this year saw a notable growth reduction when compared to the rates seen since the launch of the Affordable Care Act.
Still, there is progress being made and at the start of the year, uninsured rates hit record lows.
During the first three months of the year, the health insurance market was providing coverage for an additional 1.3 million people. That brought the rate of uninsured Americans down to 8.6 percent – lower than it has ever been. This, according to the National Health Interview Survey. That research is conducted as an ongoing project by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
At the same time, while the health insurance market is still growing, it isn’t doing so as quickly as it was.
The health care law, which is one of the largest reforms made during President Barack Obama’s time in the Oval Office, isn’t expanding at the rate it had been. The gains this year, while still significant, represent only a fraction of what was seen last year.
The health insurance exchanges opened in 2014 and brought the number of uninsured Americans down by almost 9 million people. Since the start of Obamacare, the uninsured rate has been reduced by nearly half. Still, political divisions have held strong and it is currently estimated that there are still 27.3 million uninsured people across the country.
By the end of the first quarter of 2016, there were about 21 million fewer Americans without coverage than there had been in 2010. It was in that year that Obama initially signed the Affordable Care Act and the coverage laws started to change.
That said, the National Health Interview Survey also pointed out that the percentage of people of a working age and dependents who have high-deductible health plans has risen. At the moment, an estimated 4 out of 10 people have this type of policy. Those health insurance market products require the policyholder to pay far more of their medical bills out of their own pockets before their coverage kicks in.
