Showing Medicare Advantage’s value, the sky did not fall on MA, but the earth shifted on the program.
About The Podcast:
Millions of Americans feel confused and frustrated in their search for quality healthcare coverage.
Between out-of-control costs, countless inefficiencies, a lack of affordable universal access, and little focus on wellness and prevention, the system is clearly in dire need of change.
Hosted by healthcare policy and technology expert Marc S. Ryan, the Healthcare Labyrinth Podcast offers accessible, incisive deep dives on the most pressing issues and events in American healthcare.
Marc seeks to help Americans become wiser consumers and navigate the healthcare maze with more confidence and certainty through The Healthcare Labyrinth website and his book of the same name.
Marc is an unconventional Republican who believes that affordable universal access is a wise and prudent investment. He recommends common-sense solutions to reform American healthcare.
Tune in every week as Marc examines the latest developments in the space, offering analysis, insights, and predictions on the changing state of healthcare in America.
About The Episode:
On this episode, Marc discusses the 2026 Medicare Advantage open enrollment. Showing Medicare Advantage’s value, the sky did not fall on MA, but the earth shifted on the program.
Key Takeaways:
Many analysts predicted a major contraction during open enrollment, but the Medicare Advantage program still grew.
It grew 874K year over year and about 115K during open enrollment.
MA has grown almost 50% — 11.9 million lives – since 2020.
This shows the overall value of MA compared with traditional Medicare fee-for-service (FFS).
Still growth has come way down in 2025 and 2026, which shows the financial stress in the program.
Big plans did not fare well in open enrollment, losing 328K lives. Except for Humana, which grew about 1.2M, most big MA plans wanted to contract.
Non-Big MA plans added 443,000 lives during open enrollment, including the insurtechs by 320K lives.
SNPs grew 647,000 lives year over year — 259,000 of that during open enrollment.
PPOs saw major contraction in terms of offerings and enrollment. PPOs were down year over year by 103K, while HMOs grew 937K.
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Resources:
The Healthcare Labyrinth: A Guide to Navigating Health Plans and Fixing American Health Insurance
