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NC residents urged to apply for ACA coverage ahead of deadline

By John Paul, wsoctv.com
By John Paul, wsoctv.com

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The deadline to sign up for health coverage under the Affordable Care Act is on Friday, and enrollment centers are scrambling to help people get coverage.

"We've been very, very busy. We've been receiving lots of calls, lots of people asking about information, want to know what their options are," said Elizabeth Garcia, a health insurance navigator at the Charlotte Center for Legal Advocacy in Elizabeth.

This year, the enrollment period is six weeks shorter, and so far, 209,050 people have signed up in North Carolina, compared to 549,000 last year.

Gov. Roy Cooper asked federal officials to extend the deadline at least another week to boost those numbers.

[READ MORE: North Carolina governor seeks 'Obamacare' deadline extension]

Don Jonas runs Care Ring in uptown Charlotte, a medical help center. He's said he’s not optimistic about an extension.

“The Trump Administration is pretty committed to getting rid of the Affordable Care Act, so if I was a betting man, I'd say probably not, in this case, would they allow it to happen," Jonas said.

Jonas said cuts to the advertising budget have made it harder to promote, and the shorter sign-up time isn't helping. He is urging anyone who still needs coverage to act right now because on Friday, without an extension, thousands of people will miss out.

[RELATED: Some glitches seen in deadline week for 'Obamacare' sign-ups]

"There's going to be potentially hundreds of thousands of North Carolinians that would have been eligible for very significant financial assistance through the marketplace that won't have coverage," Jonas said.

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