Will Obamacare Fix be the Biggest Hackathon in History?

There is no doubt that millions of Americans are “looking for quality, affordable health coverage, and want to find it online,” as the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services proclaimed in a blog post. 

The problem, however, is that HHS’s own website, HealthCare.gov., is a disaster. Many Americans have been unable to create accounts on the site, which would then allow them to shop for insurance plans or apply for federal assistance. 

And so a “tech surge” is underway.

According to a New York Times report, “as many as five million lines of software code may need to be rewritten before the Web site runs properly.” The entire site contains an estimated 500 million lines of code. To put that in context, that is five times the amount of code as contained in a large bank’s computer system. 

That means the government is going to need some extra help. Hence, the “surge.” According to an HHS blog post:

“Our team is bringing in some of the best and brightest from both inside and outside government to scrub in with the team and help improve HealthCare.gov.”

In the meantime, HHS wants you to join the conversation, and you can do so here:

https://www.healthcare.gov/connect/.