After a rush of 11th-hour interest, 230,624 people had enrolled in either private or public insurance through New York State’s health insurance exchange by the Dec. 24 deadline, qualifying them for coverage on the first day of the new year, state officials said on Monday.
The burst of interest in New York continued even after the deadline, with enrollments rising to 241,522 as of Monday, officials said.
Of those enrollments, 175,146 are in private commercial insurance plans, and 66,376 are in Medicaid, the government insurance program for the poor, which has spurred enrollment by raising its income limit.
Enrollment in the exchanges remains open through March 31. According to federal rules, individuals who apply by the 15th of the month will have insurance coverage on the first day of the following month, but the original Dec. 15 deadline for Jan. 1 coverage was extended because of early troubles on the website of the federal health exchange.
About 75 percent of those enrolling in individual plans on the New York exchange qualify for a subsidy to reduce the cost of coverage.
New York has surpassed the goal set by the federal government of 102,500 sign-ups by Dec. 31.
The federal goal for the March 31 enrollment deadline is 218,000 sign-ups for private insurance, as set forward in a September memo from the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare.
The state set a goal of 1.1 million enrollments by the end of 2016, and said it is on track to meet that goal.
