California has signed up more than 825,000 people in Obamacare coverage, the state reported Wednesday, topping its total enrollment goals with six weeks to go in the open enrollment period.
About 728,000 people had enrolled by the end of January, according to the state’s Obamacare marketplace, and more than 100,000 additional people have signed up in the first two weeks of February.
According to a September presentation, California was expecting a little less than 700,000 enrollments by March 31.
“These enrollment numbers mean that with six weeks to go, California has already exceeded its projected base enrollment for the 2014 open-enrollment period,” Covered California Executive Director Peter Lee said in a statement. “While this is a strong showing, our goal is not pinned to meeting projections, but to making sure every Californian gets covered.”
Prior to Obamacare’s launch, White House officials singled out California, along with Florida and Texas, as one of the key states to the law’s success. Unlike the other two, it was the only one to embrace the law wholeheartedly.
Nationwide, the law is still behind schedule, according to the most recent enrollment figures released by the Obama administration. About 3.3 million people had signed up by the end of January — still below the pace to get to 7 million enrollments on March 31, the original projection before the enrollment period launched in October.
But, after HealthCare.gov’s performance improved in December and January, January was the first individual month during which sign-ups topped the pre-law expectations.
Regardless of whether the law hits its projected marks, health policy experts have said that the current enrollment pace should be sufficient to make the law sustainable.
