The GOP-fostered uninsurance crisis is growing faster than a newborn volcano, one that will do grave harm to those directly affected and later this year will begin spewing its molten crap on everyone.

The Associated Press reported Friday that nearly 3 million people dropped Obamacare health insurance plans during the first two months of 2026. That’s a 13 percent fall from the 22.1 million people who purchased individual or family plans on the exchanges in 2025.

That’s already 40 percent of the total the Congressional Budget Office projected would drop coverage for the entire year because the GOP-run Congress refused to reauthorize those Biden-era subsidies during last year’s budget negotiations. That left millions of low-wage workers whose employers don’t provide coverage with out-of-pocket premiums they can no longer afford without the extra help.

The end to people dropping coverage is nowhere in sight. The CBO conservatively estimated 7.5 million people would drop Obamacare coverage this year. If the first quarter average holds for the rest of the year, that number will soar to more than 10 million.

Add to that the millions of people being thrown off Medicaid due to the new work requirements and bureaucratic hurdles thrown in their way, the ranks of the uninsured will likely see its largest increase in years when data for 2026 is released next year. Last May, the CDC reported 28 million people or 8.3 percent of the population did not have health insurance in 2025. With the Trump regime adding another 10 million people or more to the ranks of the uninsured, the uninsured rate is likely to jump to more than 11 percent.

(That’s my calculation: Put 38 million uninsured over a population projected to grow to 344 million this year and you get an 11 percent uninsured rate.)

How about the rest of us?

What will that mean for the 156 million or so people with employer-based coverage? Their rates will be jacked up by insurance companies to pay for the uncompensated care hospitals deliver to the uninsured in nation’s emergency rooms, where, when they get sick, they turn for care since ERs legally cannot turn them away. Moreover, they will likely be far more costly to care for since ERs are the most expensive place to get care, and they will have waited until their conditions had worsened to the point where they had to seek care.

We’re already beginning to see evidence of the premium price spikes to come. Nona Tepper of Modern Healthcare reported last week that health insurers’ preliminary filings with state regulators for individual plans sold on the exchanges will show big premiums increases next year. Employer surveys showing next year’s premiums usually aren’t released until the late fall.

Leaving people uninsured is about the stupidest and most inhumane policy any society could adopt, especially one that can afford to ensure than everyone has coverage. But, as Forrest Gump liked to say, stupid is as stupid does.

Merrill Goozner, the former editor of Modern Healthcare, writes about health care and politics at GoozNews.substack.com, where this column first appeared. Please consider subscribing to support his work.

Reprinted with permission from Gooz News