Industry News

On December 9, 2020, the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) released its report, How Has the Pandemic Affected Health Coverage in the U.S.?  The report indicates that relatively few workers have lost employer-based health insurance during the pandemic. However, those who lost coverage likely had a safety net in coverage through Medicaid or the Affordable Care Act’s individual market.

While national employment rates decreased by 6.2% from March 2020 to September 2020, enrollment in the fully-insured group market declined by 1.5%. KFF estimated that two to three million people may have lost employer-based coverage during this time period.  (In 2019, about 158 million Americans had employer coverage.)

The report also suggests that the decrease in employer-based health insurance coverage may have been offset by gains in Medicaid enrollment and stable enrollment in the individual market. Medicaid enrollment increased by more than four million people nationally from February 2020 through July 2020. In addition, individual market enrollment was relatively unchanged from March 2020 to September 2020, with less attrition than is typical during those months.

The analysis also explores several possible explanations for the relatively modest decrease in employer-based coverage despite massive job losses. It also notes that even if the uninsured rate has been steady, tens of millions of Americans remain without health coverage during the worst pandemic to affect the country in 100 years.

The report is available here.