Glitches in Healthcare Insurance Enrollment a Good Sign

Logo for the federal website to access affordable healthcare.
The site suffered some glitches yesterday as close to 3 million
tried signing up. 

By Mark E. Ruquet

There were computer glitches and failure of service notices at the launch of enrollment for health insurance on government exchanges under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. That was a good thing.

Why you may ask? One simple reason: demand outstripped capacity.

Federal officials said close to 3 million people went online at HealthCare.gov, the federal exchange, yesterday. Many received error messages and were probably frustrated. Some people spent up to three hours trying to access the system, but got nowhere.

So does that make it a failure as some pundits predict? A great federal boondoggle? Another sign of government incompetence? Nope. This is a journey on a road the United States has failed to travel, and the rest of the developed world as long since eclipsed, to provide medical coverage to all its citizens. There is great demand for affordable healthcare coverage, and the private market model has failed to fulfill that mandate.

In this information technology age, we are well aware that the launch of any new service comes with glitches. As the President pointed out in his address yesterday, Apple experienced glitches in its launch of its newest software and that did not make front-page news. We are not surprised when there are problems. We know developing technology has issues—as infuriating as that may be at times. However, that does not diminish the reality that we have a healthcare crisis in this country and this is a step in the right direction.

PPACA may not be perfect, but those in opposition have not proposed a reasonable alternative, except gutting the program. That is not an answer. When the president came out yesterday to speak he was flanked by U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius and surrounded by individuals who would benefit from PPACA. Too bad the White House could not have sent a more powerful image by having the Secretary and the CEOs of health insurance companies there instead.