WASHINGTON – State and local elected officials should “not hesitate” to tell their constituents to go to HealthCare.gov and sign up, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said Tuesday.
“We are definitely on track to have a significantly different user experience by the end of this month,” Sebelius said. “But this isn’t a magic turn-on switch. The experience is improved every day.”
Sebelius reiterated the government’s message this week: The site will be working smoothly by the end of November; people can sign up now; and no one should expect a huge change this weekend because the improvements are ongoing.
“Know that you are changing lives each and every day,” Sebelius told the officials.
The call was half pep talk – for Sebelius, too, as a state senator from Pennsylvania entreated her to “keep her head up” – and half strategy.
In Houston, a town hall meeting recently was attended by 2,000 people, Sebelius said. In Florida, they’re enrolling during after-church events.
“Those kinds of strategies can work extremely well,” Sebelius said.
The department recently announced that people have until Dec. 23, rather than Dec. 15, to enroll to receive Jan. 1 coverage, Sebelius said.
Also Tuesday, New York officials released enrollment numbers showing 76,177 have enrolled in a health plan, up from 48,162 .
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