The NY State of Health (NYSOH) is New York’s Marketplace, an online portal created to help peopel shop for health insurance through the Affordable Care Act. New York has worked hard to make NYSOH easy to use. While there have been hiccups here and there, the Department of Health announced today that a record breaking 4.9 million people used NYSOH to enroll in health coverage during this year’s open enrollment! That’s more than 25 percent of New Yorkers, and it includes 150,000 people who used NYSOH for the first time.

New Yorkers can use NYSOH to enroll in the following programs:

• Medicaid – This is New York’s public insurance program for low-income people. Enrollment into Medicaid can happen year round. This year 3.4 million New Yorkers enrolled in Medicaid using NYSOH.
• Essential Plan – This is another public plan for people who earn a bit too much for Medicaid but not enough to purchase private insurance. Almost 800,000 New Yorkers enrolled this year.
• Child Health Plus – This covers children up to age 19 whose families make too much for public programs but who cannot easily afford full coverage. About 450,000 kids enrolled in CHP this year!
• Qualified Health Plans – These are private plans that follow the ACA’s rules (such as accepting people with pre-existing conditions and covering the ten essential benefits). About 273,000 New Yorkers purchased a QHP this year. Many (58 percent) did so with help from federal subsidies they qualify for based on income. But a large number (114,000) still found plans they liked without help – a good sign that New York’s individual market is becoming more and more stable over time.