About 940,000 people signed up for insurance under the ridiculously misnamed Affordable Care Act in February, the government has announced. That isn’t the big momentum the administration needs for Obamacare, as Politico reported:

“The administration is aiming to enroll about 6 million people by the end of March — a goal that was revised down from 7 million after the disastrous start to HealthCare.gov five months ago. It will need to double the February sign-up rate to hit that mark.

“ ‘They are yet again going to fall short of their goals. They are not going to get to 6 million,’ said Douglas Holtz-Eakin of the American Action Forum.”

Holtz-Eakin’s group offers good analysis. The sign-up rate has consistently been below the Obama administration’s promises. And young people, who subsidize older people under Obamacare, aren’t buying in as heavily as the scheme needs:

“Generally healthy and frequently uninsured young adults—ages 18 through 34—are crucial to the success of the exchanges. The administration has specifically identified 2.7 million, or 39 percent of total membership, as their target for young adult enrollment in 2014. After five months, only 25 percent of exchange participants are aged between 18 and 34 years old. … If this trend continues and the exchanges meet the administrations total enrollment goal, young adult enrollment will be short by roughly 1 million.”

The administration says it won’t hold enrollment open longer, either. Instead, all that lies ahead are higher premiums. Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius testified Wednesday that Obamacare premiums are likely to go up next year.

So a bad deal for young people will become even worse.

Fortunately for them, the government may have already secretly exempted many people from Obamacare’s rule that people must buy insurance. The Wall Street Journal reported that Sebelius approved a rule change in December so that Obamacare’s high premiums are themselves a hardship that exempts people from having to buy coverage:

“ ‘The hardship exemption was part of the law from the outset,’ the Secretary said. ‘There was a specific rationale there, and it starts with the notion that if you can't afford coverage you are not obligated to buy coverage.’ That's true: But in December last year HHS ruled that ObamaCare itself was a hardship; people whose coverage was cancelled and believe the new plans are unaffordable were thus relieved of the requirement to buy insurance or else pay a penalty for the law's first year. Our scoop was that HHS last week quietly extended this dispensation until 2016.”

Enough hardship. It’s time to start figuring out how we restore freedom and choice in health care. The Wall Street Journal recommends some efforts along those lines here.