By Amina Niasse and Ahmed Aboulenein<\/p>\n
NEW YORK, May 28 (Reuters) – More Americans are dropping out or being kicked off Obamacare health insurance for non-payment than in past years, according to data through April from half a dozen states that sell the plans themselves.<\/p>\n
The cancellations are posing a political liability for President Donald \u200cTrump and the Republican party ahead of November midterm elections expected to turn on affordability.<\/p>\n
Kentucky and Idaho particularly stand out. In Kentucky, three times the number of people \u200ccanceled or were dropped from their coverage, while in Idaho enrollment shrank by 24,402 compared to a loss of 15,866 members during the same time frame a year earlier.<\/p>\n
By comparison, in California cancellations rose 6%.<\/p>\n
About 23 million people signed \u200bup for or were automatically reenrolled in 2026 health insurance plans created by President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act, a decline of 5% from last year. The decline was largely due to the end of extra subsidies created during the COVID-19 pandemic to help people keep their coverage.<\/p>\n
Without subsidies, premiums rose by an average 114% to $1,905 annually, according to data from health policy research group KFF.<\/p>\n
\u201cConsumers are being exposed to the actual unsubsidized cost of these premiums and are choosing to leave the marketplace,\u201d said Matt McGough, a policy analyst at KFF.<\/p>\n
The U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, which oversees \u200cObamacare and runs HealthCare.gov for about 30 states, did not respond \u2060to requests for comment.<\/p>\n
VOTER ISSUE<\/p>\n
Affordability of health insurance is a top issue for voters and its impact will increase as the year goes on, like \u201ca gathering storm,\u201d said Jonathan Oberlander, a professor of health policy at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine.<\/p>\n
Polling from KFF shows that \u2060affordable healthcare remains atop the list of public worries, tied with concerns over surging gasoline and transportation costs stemming from the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran.<\/p>\n
More than three-quarters of independent voters being courted by both parties say healthcare costs will affect their decision to vote and which party’s candidate they support in November.<\/p>\n
An Idaho health exchange spokesperson said affordability was the main reason for the increase in disenrollments there.<\/p>\n
By the time \u200bNovember’s \u200bmidterm elections that will decide control of Congress roll around, more Americans will have dropped coverage and media \u200battention will have grown, Oberlander said.<\/p>\n
Total Obamacare enrollment likely fell between 17% \u200cand 26% through March, according to Wakely Consulting Group, a health insurance consulting firm that analyzed premium payment data representing about 80% of the Obamacare individual market.<\/p>\n
Wakely said over 14% of enrollees did not pay their January premium, in line with a March KFF survey that found about 15% of Obamacare enrollees had not paid their premiums, largely due to higher costs.<\/p>\n
CMS had said it would release data on how many people have paid their premiums in the spring.<\/p>\n
SITUATION VARIES BY STATE<\/p>\n
Of 20 states and the District of Columbia that run their own marketplaces and were contacted by Reuters, 12 provided a snapshot view of the past several months.<\/p>\n
Connecticut, Massachusetts and New Mexico said thousands of consumers either failed to pay their first premium or lost \u200ccoverage in the early months of the year due to missed payments.<\/p>\n
Most states and the federal government allow \u200ba grace period of 90 days or more for non-payment.<\/p>\n
In Kentucky, between January and April, 15,067 people who selected 2026 plans \u200bhad lost coverage due to non-payment, up from 5,034 disenrollments for the same \u200bperiod last year.<\/p>\n
The state also saw an 8.5% decrease in overall enrollment in January, a spokesperson for Kentucky’s Cabinet for Health and Family Services said.<\/p>\n
Kentucky and Idaho may \u200calso have been hurt by the low number of insurers typical of \u200brural locales, which dampens competition and raises prices, \u200bKFF’s McGough said. A Kentucky spokesperson said the state exchange now has three insurers in 2026, down from four in 2025.<\/p>\n
Some states, like Colorado, were able to provide state-based support that helped ease affordability and terminations, said McGough, while Idaho and Kentucky did not. Colorado had a 2% drop in enrollment, as did Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n
Michele Eberle, executive director at \u200bMaryland\u2019s Health Benefit Exchange, said enrollment has fallen by 8% and \u200cthat over 60% of people who disenrolled cited increased or unmanageable costs. The state expects to see enrollment decline 15% this year, she said.<\/p>\n
“We’re going to \u200bsee month-over-month declines, especially with gas prices that are continuing to climb,” said Eberle. “We have to see where the breaking point is for people.”<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Amina \u200bNiasse in New York and Ahmed Aboulenein in Washington; editing by Caroline Humer and Bill Berkrot)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Amina Niasse and Ahmed Aboulenein NEW YORK, May 28 (Reuters) – More Americans are dropping out or…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":674161,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[8833,294043,97,252,9041,253,1853,294042,569,9378,294041,942],"class_list":["post-674160","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health-care","tag-barack-obama","tag-dozen-states","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-health-insurance","tag-healthcare","tag-idaho","tag-jonathan-oberlander","tag-kentucky","tag-kff","tag-obamacare-enrollment","tag-president-donald-trump"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/674160","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=674160"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/674160\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/674161"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=674160"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=674160"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=674160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}