By Sarah Dash, Kevin Lucia, and Justin Giovannelli 

To help consumers enroll in the recently opened health insurance marketplaces, the Affordable Care Act created outreach and consumer assistance positions such as “navigators,” in-person assisters, and certified application counselors. Although awareness of the marketplaces and the financial help they may offer has increased this month–from approximately one-third to two-thirds of potentially eligible adults–much work remains to raise awareness and protect consumers from people who hope to take advantage of their confusion. The obstacles to effective education are greatest in the 29 states where the federal government is running consumer assistance functions. In this post, the second of a two part-series, we examined consumer outreach efforts in state-based, state partnership, and federally facilitated marketplaces.  Read more here.

Editor’s Note: This blog is part of a series of blogs published by the Commonwealth Fund blog.