More than 540,000 people selected health plans through the HealthCare.gov platform during the first week of open enrollment, HHS said.
Here are four other things to know about the first week of open enrollment.
1. Almost 1.2 million consumers submitted applications for coverage through the federal marketplace. Even more signed up through their state-based marketplaces, HHS said.
2. Of the more than 540,000 people who selected health plans on the federal insurance site, about 358,000 were re-enrolling, according to HHS. The rest were new consumers.
3. HHS Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell called the numbers a "solid start." However, she noted it's difficult to directly compare this year to last year on a week-by-week basis because open enrollment began Nov. 1 this year, compared to Nov. 15 last year. Also, the time from the start of open enrollment to the Dec. 15 deadline is much longer this year. "We know from past experience that people are deadline driven, so we don't expect to see deadline effects for a few weeks," Ms. Burwell said.
4. Overall, HHS expects renewals to make up a larger share of customers this year, since there are more than 9 million people with coverage through the federal marketplace nationwide.