A total of 4.17 million consumers re-enrolled for health insurance during the open enrollment periods from Nov. 15, 2014 to Feb. 15, 2015, the Department of Health and Human Services reported.
“These numbers tell a powerful story of a strong open enrollment and of engaged and satisfied consumers,” HHS Secretary Sylvia Burwell said.
Of those who re-enrolled, 2.21 million actively renewed their coverage, while 1.96 million allowed their plans to renew automatically.
Among the group who actively selected a plan, just over 1 million made the decision to continue with the plans they had in 2014, while 1.2 million selected a new policy.
HHS considers consumers to have actively selected a plan if they had in 2014, came back, updated their application and selected a plan. They could have actively selected their 2014 plan, chosen a new plan from their existing insurer, or selected a new plan from a different insurer.
The agency considers a consumer to have automatically re-enrolled if they were enrolled in a marketplace plan in 2014 and did not select a plan before the Dec. 15 deadline to make changes.
If a consumer decided after the deadline to select a different plan, or needed to update their information, he or she could make that change before enrolment closed Feb. 15, and would then be counted having actively selected a plan.