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Just before deadline, Obamacare reaches lowest approval rating ever

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In the lead-up to Obamacare’s soft deadline Monday, the health care law has earned its lowest approval rating since passage, according to an Associated Press poll.

Just 26 percent of Americans support the Affordable Care Act, the AP-GfK survey found Friday. The poll was completed before the Obama administration announced six million people had selected health care plans on the exchanges, albeit without information on who has actually paid.

The numbers are slight, though statistically insignificant change, from December’s poll numbers, which saw 27 percent of the country support the law. Despite the uptick in enrollment since the federal exchange was embroiled in serious technological issues, the public still doesn’t favor the health care law itself.

Public opinion on Obamacare’s launch remains low as well, despite the administration’s improvements to the health care exchanges. Just 26 percent believe Obamacare’s launch has gone at least somewhat well, and 59 percent of those who said they or a family member tried to sign up reported having problems. While enrollment remains below the administration’s original predictions, the tech improvements have been a rare high note for officials.

The AP noted earlier this week that the federal exchange HealthCare.gov was still experiencing problems, though the administration has brushed aside the website’s technological problems. An analysis for the AP from Compuware, a website analytics company, found that HealthCare.gov’s speed was “unacceptable” with almost twice the response time for the top private health insurance websites.

While the consumer-facing portion of the website is still not be meeting private sector standards, the back-end remains unfinished. The portion of the website that connects the government with insurance companies still hasn’t been fixed, Fox News reported. Administration officials warned earlier this year that it would be vital for the back end of the website to be completed before the (sort of) deadline Monday.

“Insurance executives just see this as a major nightmare,” said health industry expert Robert Laszewski. “I mean, when are we finally going to be able to reconcile all the data, to know who is really covered, who is really paid, and what the insurance companies should be paid for?”

The Obama administration declined for the second time in a row to report any information with its new enrollment numbers, such as how many customers have purchased their insurance plans. (RELATED: How many have paid Obamacare premiums?)

Just 13 percent expect the law to be fully repealed. But 70 percent of Americans are anticipating Obamacare has some changes in store.

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