Industry-wide the June print for Medicare Advantage enrollment was not particularly special. Overall enrollment increased 7.92% YoY, unchanged from May. MoM, enrollment decelerated slightly from 0.38% in May to 0.33% in June. Total Medicare Advantage enrollment stands at 31.9M versus 31.9 last month and 29.6M at the same time last year.
Both HUM and UNH beat industry trend. HUM increased enrollment 12.51% YoY, an acceleration from last month's 12.09%. Sequentially, enrollment at HUM grew 0.60% versus 0.90% in May. UNH's enrollment increased 13.97% YoY and 0.44% sequentially.
HUM continues to shed stand-alone PDP members which, as we mentioned on the Health Policy Macro Themes. (replay here) is a necessary response to the Part D benefit redesign that will require plans to bear more of the cost of drugs in the catastrophic phase. While the MA plans picked up 34k members, the stand-alone PDP plans lost 12k.
The recent concerns about medical cost spend are valid and getting more so as utilization ramps in what is now a sicker American population. The road out of that will be enrollment and after that, consolidation. That outcome is nearly assured as the over-65 population growth slows in the face of demographics.
Let me know if you have any questions.
Emily Evans
Managing Director – Health Policy
Twitter
LinkedIn
