Health-Care Law Helps Add 3 Million to Medicaid - More Americans Accessing Program Since Start of Open Enrollment Period

From The Wall Street Journal:

The Obama administration said Friday that three million additional Americans were enrolled in Medicaid as of the end of February than were in the program before the start of the health law's open enrollment period Oct. 1, suggesting the law allowed more people to gain Medicaid coverage.

Medicaid and Chip are federal-state health-insurance programs for low-income Americans. Under the health law, states had the option of expanding Medicaid to people less than 65 years old with incomes up to 133% of the federal poverty level, or about $15,521 for an individual and $31,721 for a family of four. About half of the states expanded Medicaid while the rest kept to prior state income guidelines.

Earlier this week, the Obama administration said about 7.1 million people have signed up for private health-insurance plans as of March through federal and state marketplaces, beating original expectations that the law would provide coverage to six million or seven million Americans in 2014. Those figures didn't include Medicaid enrollment. Open enrollment under the health law technically ended March 31, but the federal HealthCare.gov insurance exchange and states with their own exchanges are continuing to process applications for health coverage.