The Obama administration has picked a Connecticut official to run HealthCare.gov ahead of a second open enrollment season looming as a test of competence for the feds.Kevin Counihan leads Access Health CT, a health insurance marketplace seen as a national model.
“The fundamental key to success in building any of these exchanges is frankly no different than it is with any other business enterprise,” Counihan said in June when the state unveiled a healthcare mobile app. “That is that is begins with people. When you hire the right staff at the senior level, they tend to hire the right staff at the director level, who hires the right staff at the manager level and it cascades down.”
Counihan will go from overseeing a Connecticut enrollment of about 80,000 people to more than 5 million people who’ve signed up in the 36 states served by the federal marketplace.
The exchanges offer subsidized private coverage to people who don't have workplace health plans.
The role of federal CEO is new, created to avoid a repeat of last year's technical meltdown.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
