Healthcare.gov defects leave more than 100,000 poor without coverage

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Ed Morrissey:

It’s bad enough that the central web portal of the ObamaCare system couldn’t handle the private-sector insurer protocol for transmitting enrollment information. The 834 system has been in use for decades, but somehow the geniuses at HHS failed to program the output from Healthcare.gov to match it. It’s quite another when the federal government’s websitecan’t talk to systems in state governments — for public-assistance programs that have been around a lot longer than the 834s.

More than 100,000 poor people have no coverage now thanks to that “glitch,” reports the Washington Post:

More than 100,000 Americans who applied for insurance through HealthCare.gov and were told they are eligible for Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) remain unenrolled because of lingering software defects in the federal online marketplace, according to federal and state health officials.

To try to provide coverage to these people before they seek medical care, the Obama administration has launched a barrage of phone calls in recent days in 21 states, advising those who applied that the quickest route into the programs is to start over at their state’s Medicaid agency.

State officials, meanwhile, are racing to cope in various ways — some enrolling people based on imperfect data files they received from Washington, others mailing letters urging eligible people to contact the state to sign up.

The chaos is likely to prove temporary because of the state and federal efforts that have just begun to help people enroll and because the coverage can be made retroactive to the first of the year.

Still, the fact that some consumers learned on HealthCare.gov that they could join the two programs but are not yet in them is creating a problem for states and confusion for the consumers. The situation also offers a glimpse of the technical problems that persist with the computer system underpinning the new federal online insurance marketplace more than a month after the Obama administration announced it had largely been fixed.

Yes, it does provide a glimpse of the technical problems. On a larger level, though, it provides a glaring example of the incompetence of HHS. One might be able to understand how HHS could get confused on 834s with private-sector insurers, although HHS has spent years coordinating with the same exact insurers as part of the Medicare Advantage program. Medicaid, on the other hand, is a federally-coordinated program that has integrated with state systems for decades.

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Interestingly, 8 years ago Bush’s Medicare prescription drug program knocked six million previously insured seniors out of coverage. Computer glitches prevented hundreds of thousands more from getting their medications.

Yet despite Democrat’s dislike of the program, they worked with republicans to correct the glitches.

Yet despite Democrat’s dislike of the program,

Um, seems someone just said there are no Democrats, only Democratics.

Ronald J. Ward
TED CRUZ had a good message for OBAMA, and TED deliver the message,
but OBAMA SAID HE WON’T NEGOTIATE EVER, i think HE PREFER TO BURN HIS OBAMA CARE first,
BEFORE TALKING TO THE REPUBLICANS,
WHY SHOULD THE REPUBLICANS HELP HIS NON NEGOTIATE PLAN,
AND GET THE BLAMES AS USUAL, FOR THE MANY GLITCHES,

@Ronald J. Ward:

Conservatives didn’t support Bush’s drug plan anyway.
Obamacare is a huge lie. It isn’t just a matter of “glitches” that just need to be fixed for obamacare to begin magically working. Obamacare is unworkable, as Obama’s repeated unlawful partial delays and exemptions for cronies clearly demonstrate.

PETE
THAT”S THE FIRST THING WHICH STRUCK ME,
why those are exempt? this is evil and robbing the citizens who pay for the poors they always did
before OBAMA, he think he invent the wheel of charity,; he use the people’s money and he look
generous with it and all around the world he does it,
WHAT A FREAKING FALSE PRESENTATION,
THE SUPER WELL PAID UNION WORKER AND THE UNIONS ARE EXEMPT,
THE PUBLIC EMPLOYEES IN THE GOVERNMENT WITH ALL THE BENEFITS VACATION PAID AND
BONUS, ARE EXEMPT, THE IRS WHO TORMENTED THE TEA PARTY ARE EXEMPT,
AND THE ELECTED ARE EXEMPT AND THE WHITE HOUSE EXEMPT WITH THEIR MILLION DOLLAR JOBS INCLUDING THE MILLION DOLLAR LAWYERS, ALL PAID BY THE CITIZENS,
WHAT A FREAKING INJUSTICE DONE TO THE PEOPLE STRUGGLING TO CLOSE THEIR BUDGET
THIS IS THE MOST ABUSIVE OBAMACARE EVER TO BE SEEN,
NO WANDER TED CRUZ ASK TO DEFUND IT,
IT’S A MONSTER,

And what about those red states who refused medicaid expansion at not cost to them? They put millions in the position of no health care.

Careful who you blame wingnuts.

@This one:
More of your marxist idiocy. You really don’t know how ignorant you are.

The medicaid expansion does not cost states for the first year, but in future years the state is on the hook for at least 10% of the costs of the medicaid expansion, and no telling how much that state percentage will be increased in the future. States that have balanced budget amendments correctly realized that they would not be able to pay the increased costs so they took the path of fiscal responsibility and refused to be taken in by the leftist scam.

Shove your false compassion for the poor up your marxist piehole.

All kinds of ”glitches” are still messing up people who need coverage for themselves and their families.
Even Rand Paul had a glitch put his son (only) on Medicaid!
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/01/06/paul-says-kentucky-run-obamacare-site-also-mess-gave-son-medicaid/
Most people have no idea if they have coverage or not.
And hospitals are in the same boat.
Should they ASS-YOU-ME that people are insured who think they might be?
Or should they turn sick and injured people away?
What a mess!

@Pete: ‘The medicaid expansion does not cost states for the first year, but in future years the state is on the hook for at least 10% of the costs of the medicaid expansion, and no telling how much that state percentage will be increased in the future. States that have balanced budget amendments correctly realized that they would not be able to pay the increased costs so they took the path of fiscal responsibility and refused to be taken in by the leftist scam’

That’s total crap and you know it. lol!

Anatomy of an Obamacare �horror story�
http://www.healthinsurance.org/blog/2014/01/03/anatomy-of-an-obamacare-horror-story/

As much as you try to spin it Pete, the fact remains millions are not covered in Red States becasue of their Legislator’s ignorance and malice in refusing to expand Medicaid.

@This one:

And those red states that had the wisdom to turn down Obama’s effort to dump the cost on them in a couple of years will be the ones that remain financial solvent while those blue states continue to rust themselves in the ground.

This one
you are as blind as a bat, and ignorant big fingers typing what you think,
no one want to know your life,