The public exchanges managed by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) have received plan selection information for 1,000 or more people in at least 1,925 ZIP code zones.
HHS has published zone-by-zone exchange plan activity for the 37 states in which HHS runs the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) exchange program. The database covers the period from Nov. 15, when the 2015 open enrollment period began, through Jan. 16.
See also: PPACA open enrollment 2015: Popcorn time
The HHS-run exchanges received QHP selection information for 400,253 people for the week ending Jan. 16, up from 163,050 for the week ending Jan. 9. The overall QHP selection total at the HHS-run exchanges increased to 7.2 million. The figures include people who actively used HealthCare.gov or other channels to select 2015 coverage, and it also includes holders of 2014 QHP coverage from the HHS-run exchanges who let their coverage auto renew.
The ZIP code activity file gives information for 13,725 zones. It excludes zones in which the HHS-run exchanges have received qualified health plan (QHP) selection information for 50 or fewer people.
In the zones around the median for the plans included — around slot 6,877 — the HHS-run exchanges have received QHP selection information for 257 people.
The zones in the sixth slot up to the second slot have each generated QHP selection information for 8,000 to 9,000 people.
The top zone has produced 12,330 plan selections.
To provide a rough picture of how QHP activity is going in the HHS-run exchange states, we created a list of the 10 most active ZIP code zones — but, to make the list more entertaining, we cheated by using only one zone per state.
If we had simply included the 10 most active zones, all of the entries would have been for zones in one state.
To learn more about we found in the zone-by-zone database, read on.
10. Kansas: ZIP Code 66062
Community: Olathe, Kan.
Slot in the HHS zone database: 181.
(Image: Kansas sunflower field)
9. Oregon: ZIP Code 97701
Community: Bend, Ore.
Slot in the HHS zone database: 166.
Image: The Oregon Trail (National Park Service photo)
8. Illinois: ZIP Code 60647
Community: Chicago
Slot in the HHS zone database: 163.
(Image: Chicago)
7. Tennessee: ZIP Code 37013
Community: Antioch, Tenn.
Slot in the HHS zone database: 137.
