Roundtable called in Albany to get young adults connected to Affordable Care Act coverage

ALBANY — The open enrollment period for the Affordable Care Act marketplace is about to roll around again, prompting officials to start another push to get young adults covered.

Enroll America-Georgia, the organization that runs the Get Covered America campaign, partnered with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services-Region IV, U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Structured Employment Economic Development Corporation and Young Invincibles, a national non-profit focusing on empowering young Americans with information regarding many essential interests including health care, convened at a Healthcare Partners Outreach Training and Roundtable Forum at Albany State University on Thursday.

The purpose of the roundtable was to meet with leaders in the Albany area who have been working to educate young adults about the Affordable Care Act, and maximize consumer access and enrollment in marketplace health plans for Albany’s young adult population ahead of the next open enrollment period that begins on Nov. 15.

Dante’ McKay, Georgia’s state director for Get Covered America, said the effort was about bringing in stakeholders to establish a balance of young and old in the marketplace. It is a collaborative, he said, to discuss best practices and coordinate calendars.

“The idea behind the Affordable Care Act is for more to have coverage,” McKay said. “To have a good pool, you need a good mix to balance it out. It brings the rates down for everyone.”

One of the outreach tactics Get Covered America, as well as other organizations, have proven to be effective for young adults is social media.

“We want to connect them and get engaged,” McKay said. “(Young adults) can stay on their parents’ insurance until they are 26 years old. We don’t want them to wait until then to think about this.”

The roundtable took place at the campus’ Eula Lovett Hall, where best outreach practices were shared.

Kaissa Denis, Young Invincibles navigator and state outreach coordinator for the Washington, D.C. and Virginia area, gave a presentation of best practices. In the course of doing so, she noted that Young Invincibles had found that more than 60 percent of traditional college-aged adults were unaware coverage would be affordable to them, and that there was likely an even larger number of adults that age who were uninsured.

Denis also gave some best practice tips as far as multi-day educational and enrollment events were concerned, such as partnering with an area school to utilize its computer lab, using various promotional efforts to build attendance and making it a family-friendly setting. She also noted that, for educational opportunities, it would be helpful to piggyback on existing events when appropriate, set up tables in high traffic areas, pass out flyers, use seasonal events as platforms, maintain strategic partnerships and tell success stories.

“We want to have more large-scaled enrollment events, and I want to have another National Youth Enrollment Day,” she said. “We have a shorter time frame (this year), so we have to be even more strategic.”

Health insurance coverage data available from the U.S. Census Bureau shows that 2,688 men in Dougherty County last year ages 18-24 had no health coverage while 2,290 Dougherty County men in the same age group had insurance. In the 25-34 age group, 2,988 Dougherty County men had no health coverage while 2,522 did.

For women ages 18-24 in Dougherty County, 2,438 had no health coverage while 3,559 had coverage. Of the 6,706 Dougherty County women ages 25-34, 2,089 had no coverage while 4,617 had coverage, the census data from last year showed.

The open enrollment period for the second year is Nov. 15 through Feb. 15.