16 million Americans will have their health insurance cancelled

I have maintained that at the end of the enrollment period there will be fewer people insured than before it began. There will be more people on Medicaid if that can be counted as a success. According to Bob Laszewski, a frequently cited health insurance expert, some 16 million Americans are now getting notices that their policies will be cancelled. Some of these people will go to exchanges and get the shock of their live when they see the premium prices and many will be priced out of the market.

The U.S. individual health insurance market currently totals about 19 million people. Because the Obama administration's regulations on grandfathering existing plans were so stringent about 85% of those, 16 million, are not grandfathered and must comply with Obamacare at their next renewal. The rules are very complex. For example, if you had an individual plan in March of 2010 when the law was passed and you only increased the deductible from $1,000 to $1,500 in the years since, your plan has lost its grandfather status and it will no longer be available to you when it would have renewed in 2014. These 16 million people are now receiving letters from their carriers saying they are losing their current coverage and must re-enroll in order to avoid a break in coverage and comply with the new health law's benefit mandates––the vast majority by January 1. Most of these will be seeing some pretty big rate increases. But unless they live in Washington state, Nevada, Colorado, and Kentucky, they can't now get on an exchange site to see their plan options, new prices, and provider directories so they can make an informed decision before they lose their coverage.

It's not all speculation. See this NY Post editorial blaming Obamacare for 800,000 New Jersey residents loosing their coverage. "If you like your health insurance you can keep it."