Thousands of seniors are receiving notification that their Medicare Advantage plan won't be available next year, and there's nothing they can do about it except find another option. One in 10 Medicare Advantage policyholders face forced disenrollment this year, according to an analysis by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. That's as many as 2.9 million Americans.
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Older Americans in Vermont will be particularly hard hit, with 92% of policyholders forced to find another option. The first major insurer to announce its exit from multiple markets in 2027 is Humana, which is doing so for the second consecutive year. This will impact 600,000 members, Humana's CFO Celeste Mellet said during a Q2 earnings call, adding that plan exits will be used to "prioritize higher-performing plans." During the first half of 2026, Humana reported a profit of $1.9 billion.
"Sadly, Humana's decision is another sign that Medicare Advantage insurers are prioritizing profit growth over enrollment growth," Shannon Benton, executive director of advocacy group Senior Citizens League, told MarketWatch. "We expect to hear more from the major insurers in the coming weeks." Medicare Advantage (MA), which operates at the county level, is a private-plan alternative to traditional Medicare. As of 2026, more than half (55%) of eligible Medicare beneficiaries were enrolled in MA plans, according to KFF, while nearly a quarter (23%) of MA enrollees had a special needs plan.
Enrollment in MA plans had been growing steadily for more than two decades, attracting older Americans away from traditional Medicare with dental, vision and hearing benefits — often with low or zero monthly premiums. But that changed in 2025. "Multiple large insurers have now substantially reduced their Medicare Advantage offerings for 2026, citing financial pressures and policy uncertainty," the John Hopkins research notes.
Federal policy changes aimed at reducing overpayments are resulting in lower reimbursement rates from the government to insurers. That, along with rising medical costs, is squeezing insurers' profitability margins, which is why many are cutting benefits or exiting markets altogether. The John Hopkins researchers found that annual forced disenrollment rates averaged around 1% between 2018 and 2024.
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