The passage of the Affordable Care Act provided many health foundations an unprecedented opportunity to expand affordable coverage to lower-income and vulnerable people through the new health insurance marketplaces. The national enrollment strategy for states using the marketplace at healthcare.gov (the Marketplace) focused resources on states with higher numbers of uninsured, with fewer resources provided to states like Maine with high coverage rates. Maine’s two navigators received less than $600,000, and neither the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services nor Enroll America spent any marketing money in the state to promote the Marketplace, and the state government remained largely disengaged from assisting with enrollment efforts.
Despite these odds, Maine still had one of the highest enrollment rates per capita of the 27 Federally Facilitated Marketplace states. This Views from the Field describes what contributed to Maine’s success.