COVID-19 Hit Harder Than Expected: Anthem CEO

For 2021, "our [annual election period] performance is in line with expectations, and we expect another year of double-digit growth," Boudreaux said.

Anthem's 2021 Medicare Advantage enrollment growth is higher than the industry average, Boudreaux said.

Employer Plans

The firm's local employer group enrollment ended up growing, year-over-year, in spite of all of the furloughs and other pandemic-related economic disruption, said Pete Haytaian, president of Anthem's commercial and specialty business division.

Overall employer plan sales were strong, even though many employers made decisions about 2021 coverage later than usual, company executives said.

Boudreau noted that sales of dental and vision plans to large employers have been higher this year than they were last year.

Affordable Care Act Public Exchange Plans

Haytaian also talked some about how Anthem sees HealthCare.gov and other parts of the ACA public exchange program.

(Related: ACA Definitions: Enrollment Period Basics)

The ACA exchange program started up in late 2013. It's supposed to provide a web-based supermarket for commercial health insurance.

Anthem increased the number of counties in its ACA exchange plan service area this year. It is happy with its exchange plan sales, but "there does appear to be less overall new sales," Haytaian said.

The drop may be due to a combination of "less overall government engagement" and state moves to extend individual health coverage enrollment deadlines, Haytaian said.

The drop in government engagement "could change with the Biden administration, just in terms of overall marketing," Haytaian said. "We do remain optimistic regarding this business. The new administration, certainly, looks like they're going to promote the ACA business."

The Biden administration hopes to add special enrollment periods throughout the year and may spend more money on exchange plan marketing and enrollment efforts, Haytaian said.

Numbers

Anthem ended the year providing or administering health coverage for 43 million people, up from 41 million people a year earlier.

Here's what happened to the number of people covered by specific types of Anthem health coverage products between the fourth quarter of 2019 and the latest quarter:

• Individual Commercial: 680,000 (down from 684,000)
• Medicare Advantage: 1.4 million (up from 1.2 million)
• Medicare Supplement: 933,000 (up from 905,000)
• Self-Funded Employer Plans: 25.6 million (up from 25.4 million)
• Dental: 6.4 million (up from 6.3 million)
• Vision: 7.5 million (up from 7.3 million)

— Read UnitedHealth Kicks Off Insurer Earnings Season, on ThinkAdvisor.

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