States beginning to release Obamacare signup numbers; Md. reports 566 1,121 apps processed; Updated

Brett T. | 7:42 PM on October 11, 2013

We learned from Treasury Secretary Jack Lew and others in the administration that “interest” in Obamacare health insurance exchanges was about the only metric the White House wanted to talk about, with every hit on HealthCare.gov considered a sign of that interest. Others were more interested in actual insurance policies sold, especially when reporters seemed to have a particularly hard time finding successful buyers to interview (and no, that doesn’t include the OFA volunteer who didn’t actually buy a policy).

Tonight, at last, we finally have some concrete numbers of “applications started” and the much smaller number of “applications processed” for those states that are running their own exchanges. Here’s a chart from the AP, and it looks like fewer than 100,000 applications have been processed, which seems in line with that leaked report yesterday showing 51,000 applications. Was that worth uprooting the nation’s existing private health insurance system?

https://twitter.com/passantino/status/388802651938254848

Of course, these are only self-reported numbers from the first week. But is that surge of interest likely to maintain its momentum, especially when those “glitches” keeping people from signing up don’t look to be clearing up any time soon?

https://twitter.com/Orangetrees2/status/388803439725379584

If that’s the case, interest and applications will have to pick up exponentially if there’s any hope of paying the claims.