On the last day to sign up for Obamacare, evidence appears to be mounting that what started as a disaster may turn out a success. 
 
 Monday is the deadline to enroll in health insurance for 2014 via the health insurance exchanges created by President Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act, and it's clear that many waited until the last minute. The looming deadline and fear of the penalty for not getting covered has driven millions of people to the exchange websites, enrollment events and health insurance companies over the past few days. 
 
 HealthCare.gov and some state-run health insurance exchanges suffered software glitches and buckled under heavy demand Monday. 
 
 The final rush could push the total number of private insurance enrollments well past the 6 million figure touted by the Obama administration last week. Obamacare sign-ups may wind up closer to the 7 million originally predicted for the first year. 
 
 "It's kind of the lead-up to Christmas right now, and all the last-minute shoppers are out," said Brian Lobley, senior vice president for marketing and consumer business at Independence Blue Cross in Philadelphia. 
 
 The company, which serves the city and its surrounding suburbs, signed up 28,000 customers in less than three weeks in March. It signed up 90,000 in the five months prior. 
 
 Edward Patton, 43, became one of those last-minute sign-ups Saturday afternoon. Patton, who works at a gas station, stumbled onto an enrollment event at a ShopRite grocery store near his home in Philadelphia. 
 
 "I just came to pick up a couple things," said Patton, who has never had health coverage before. He also picked up a "silver" level health insurance plan, the second-lowest level of coverage available on the exchanges, for $77.49 a month, including tax credits, which was far less than he expected to pay, he said. "This is good, just in case, because I barely get sick," he said. 
 
 
 
 Paydon Miller of Enroll America, left, and enrollment counselor Francine Piesto at a ShopRite in Philadelphia Saturday. 
 
 
 
 Signing up the healthy and the young is critical to the health of the healthcare law. And based on anecdotal accounts from health insurance companies, the surge is also bringing along young adults in greater numbers. 
 
 "We're definitely seeing some younger consumers, as our average age of an applicant is going down," said Kurt Kossen, the vice president for retail marketing at Chicago-based Health Care Service Corp., which operates Blue Cross and Blue Shield companies in Illinois, Montana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas. Online insurance broker eHealth reported a similar trend last week. 
 
 
 
 Insurance agents working for Independence Blue Cross assist customers signing up for health coverage at the company's Philadelphia headquarters Saturday. 
 
 In order to make premiums affordable in future years, insurers need healthier people to offset the high medical costs of older, sicker people who now have guaranteed access to coverage. Adults 18 to 34 years old made up one-quarter of nationwide enrollments through March 1, according to the Department of Health and Human Services, a proportion lower than the roughly 40 percent the White House is seeking. 
 
 Not everyone is so pleased with their new health plans. Households with incomes above four times the poverty limit, or about $95,400 for a family of four, don't qualify for financial assistance and can face hundreds of dollars in premiums every month for even basic coverage. And many people who previously purchased their own coverage directly from insurance companies saw their policies canceled last year because they didn't meet ACA standards, and had to replace them with plans that are often costlier because the mandated benefits are more generous. 
 
 The vulnerability of Obama's signature domestic policy achievement was evident during the early hours of Monday morning, when HealthCare.gov went down due to what the White House described as a software error not related to traffic on the website. The outage echoed the technical failures that marred the debut of the health insurance exchanges on Oct. 1 and hampered the first two months of the six-month enrollment period. 
 
 HealthCare.gov also drew record demand Monday when 1.2 million users visited the website by noon Eastern Time. First-time users of the website weren't able to create accounts for about an hour Monday afternoon and administrators twice activated the site's "virtual waiting room" when the number of people trying to log in surpassed its capacity, which is estimated at 100,000 users at once. State-run exchange websites in places like California and Maryland also experienced some difficulties. Telephone call centers for the exchanges were swamped by consumers seeking help, as well. 
 
 Although Monday is the nominal deadline for anyone who doesn't have health coverage to get insured this year, enrollments will continue through the coming weeks, since the Obama administration and most state-run health insurance exchanges are leaving the systems open for those who already started their applications but have not completed them by the end of the day. 
 
 Consumers in states using federally managed exchanges via HealthCare.gov can self-attest that they began the process prior to the deadline to qualify for a so-called special enrollment period. Across the remaining states, the rules vary. For example, in Connecticut, Monday remains the hard deadline, while Oregon residents have until the end of April. 
 
 Those who don't get health benefits from their jobs or through a government program won't be able to purchase private health insurance until the next open enrollment period begins Nov. 15 for policies that will take effect on Jan. 1, 2015. 
 
 Most people who fail to enroll in coverage for this year will face tax penalties under the ACA's individual mandate. There are a slew of exemptions from the mandate, however, and the health insurance exchanges will remain open for people who experience "qualifying life events," such as moving to a new state or losing their current health insurance plan. In addition, individuals eligible for Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program can enroll year-round. 
 
 Despite the apparent turnaround since the disastrous October launch of the exchanges, the future of Obamacare is uncertain. Comprehensive data on how many people fully enrolled by paying their insurance premiums and how many of the previously uninsured gained coverage because of the law won't be available for some time, nor will information about the medical costs of those who purchased private insurance via the exchange or directly from an insurer. 
 
 The process of preparing for the 2015 enrollment period will start almost immediately after the inaugural sign-up period ends, as health insurance companies must begin making projections about how much their new customers will cost them, and therefore how much to raise rates for next year. The federal government and states like Oregon and Maryland, which faced major technical problems, also must decide how to improve their performance so that next year's enrollment period goes more smoothly than this year's. 
 
 This post has been updated with information on traffic to Healthcare.gov on Monday afternoon. ||||| If you'd like to sign up for coverage under President Barack Obama's controversial health care law, you're out of luck until November. The open enrollment period closed for most people Monday at the end of a last-minute surge nearly derailed by yet another round of technical glitches. 
 
 The White House said Monday it expected enrollment numbers to be "significantly above six million" by day's end — a benchmark that seemed insurmountable last fall during the insurance marketplace's troubled rollout. 
 
 The official enrollment tally comes close to the Congressional Budget Office's original forecast of seven million by the end of March, but here's a snapshot of other numbers that help tell the story of the law best known as Obamacare: 
 
 1,857: The number of days since President Obama, in his first address to a joint session of Congress, called for sweeping health care reform: "Let there be no doubt," Obama said Feb. 24, 2009, "health care reform cannot wait, it must not wait, and it will not wait another year." 
 
 22: The number of pens President Obama used to sign the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act into law during a ceremony in the East Room of the White House on March 23, 2010. 
 
 47 million: The approximate number of Americans who went without health insurance before Obamacare was signed into law, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. 
 
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 54: The number of times House Republicans have voted to repeal, revamp or revise Obamacare since they took control of the lower chamber in 2011. 
 
 0: The chance President Obama would sign a bill repealing the Affordable Care Act. "We're not repealing it as long as I'm president," Obama said at a White House event in late 2013. 
 
 5 to 4: The vote by the Supreme Court to uphold the "individual mandate" — a key provision of the law requiring Americans to obtain insurance or pay a penalty. The court ruled the penalty was authorized by Congress' power to levy taxes. 
 
 $95: The law says you can be penalized $95 or one percent of your salary — whichever is greater — for not signing up for insurance. 
 
 26,000: The number of Americans who managed to sign up for health insurance plans in the first month of HealthCare.gov's balky and glitch-plagued rollout. 
 
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 36: The number of states served by the federal government's health insurance exchange website. The 14 other states, plus Washington, D.C., are running their own enrollment websites. 
 
 9: The number of deadline extensions and rule exceptions the Obama administration has made to the health care law's rules since it was signed into law. 
 
 26: The age until which people can stay on parental health plans, per the law's rules. 
 
 24.3 million: The approximate number of results of a Google search for the word "Obamacare," as of Monday. 
 
 229: The number of days until the next health plan open enrollment period begins. 
 
 Maggie Fox of NBC News contributed to this report. ||||| WASHINGTON (AP) — Beating expectations, President Barack Obama's health care overhaul was on track to sign up more than 7 million Americans for health insurance on deadline day Monday, government officials told The Associated Press. 
 
 A screen shows the countdown for the deadline to sign up for health insurance during a health care enrollment event at SEIU-UHW office, Monday, March 31, 2014, in Commerce, Calif. Monday marks this year's... (Associated Press) 
 
 Lisa Valera and her husband Manuel sign up for Obamacare at the Community Service Society, Monday, March 31, 2014 in New York. The troubled U.S. government web site for signing up for health insurance... (Associated Press) 
 
 SEIU-UHW worker Kathy Santana, left , assists Ruben Torres, 27, during a health care enrollment event at SEIU-UHW office, Monday, March 31, 2014, in Commerce, Calif. Monday is the deadline to sign up... (Associated Press) 
 
 Charles Ellis, 53, of Salt Lake City, right, works with navigator Luis Rios while seeking help to buy health insurance at the Utah Health Policy Project Monday, March 31, 2014, in Salt Lake City. Ellis... (Associated Press) 
 
 The HealthCare.gov website is shown on a laptop in Washington, Monday, March 31, 2014. Today is the deadline to sign up for private heath insurance in the online markets created by President Obama's heath... (Associated Press) 
 
 People line up to enroll for health insurance at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas on Monday, March 31, 2014. The deadline is just hours away to sign up for insurance in the first enrollment period... (Associated Press) 
 
 The 7 million target, thought to be out of reach by most experts, was in sight on a day that saw surging consumer interest as well as vexing computer glitches that slowed sign-ups on the HealthCare.gov website. 
 
 Two government officials confirmed the milestone, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter ahead of an official announcement. 
 
 Seven million was the original target set by the Congressional Budget Office for enrollment in taxpayer-subsidized private health insurance through new online markets created under Obama's signature legislation. 
 
 That was scaled back to 6 million after the disastrous launch of HealthCare.gov last fall. Several state-run websites also had crippling problems. 
 
 Americans who rushed to apply for health insurance Monday faced long, frustrating waits and a new spate of website ills on deadline day. 
 
 "This is like trying to find a parking spot at Wal-Mart on Dec. 23," said Jason Stevenson, working with a Utah nonprofit group helping people enroll. 
 
 At times, more than 125,000 people were simultaneously using HealthCare.gov, straining it beyond its capacity. For long stretches Monday, applicants were shuttled to a virtual waiting room where they could leave an email address and be contacted later. 
 
 Officials said the site had not crashed but was experiencing very heavy volume. The website, which was receiving 1.5 million visitors a day last week, had recorded about 2 million through 3 p.m. EDT. Call centers have more than 840,000 calls. 
 
 Supporters of the health care law fanned out across the country in a final dash to sign up uninsured Americans. People not signed up for health insurance by the deadline, either through their jobs or on their own, were subject to being fined by the IRS, and that threat was helping drive the final dash. 
 
 The administration announced last week that people still in line by midnight would get extra time to enroll. 
 
 The website stumbled early in the day — out of service for nearly four hours as technicians patched a software bug. Another hiccup in early afternoon temporarily kept new applicants from signing up, and then things slowed further. Overwhelmed by computer problems when launched last fall, the system has been working much better in recent months, but independent testers say it still runs slowly. 
 
 At Chicago's Norwegian American Hospital, people began lining up shortly after 7 a.m. to get help signing up for subsidized private health insurance. 
 
 Lucy Martinez, an unemployed single mother of two boys, said she'd previously tried to enroll at a clinic in another part of the city but there was always a problem. She'd wait and wait and they wouldn't call her name, or they would ask her for paperwork that she was told earlier she didn't need, she said. Her diabetic mother would start sweating so they'd have to leave. 
 
 She's heard "that this would be better here," said Martinez, adding that her mother successfully signed up Sunday at a different location. 
 
 At St. Francis Hospital in Wilmington, Del., enrollment counselor Hubert Worthen plunged into a long day. "I got my energy drink," he said. "This is epic, man." 
 
 At a Houston community center, there were immigrants from Ethiopia, Nepal, Eritrea, Somalia, Iraq, Iran and other conflict-torn areas, many of them trying anew after failing to complete applications previously. In addition to needing help with the actual enrollment, they needed to wait for interpreters. Many had taken a day off from work, hoping to meet the deadline. 
 
 The White House and other supporters of the law were hoping for an enrollment surge that would confound skeptics. 
 
 The insurance markets — or exchanges — offer subsidized private health insurance to people who don't have access to coverage through their jobs. The federal government is taking the lead in 36 states, while 14 other states plus Washington, D.C., are running their own enrollment websites. 
 
 New York, running its own site, reported more than 812,000 had signed up by Sunday morning, nearly 100,000 of them last week. 
 
 However, it's unclear what those numbers may mean. 
 
 The administration hasn't said how many of the 6 million people nationally who had signed up before the weekend ultimately closed the deal by paying their first month's premiums. Also unknown is how many were previously uninsured — the real test of Obama's health care overhaul. In addition, the law expands coverage for low-income people through Medicaid, but only about half the states have agreed to implement that option. 
 
 Cheering on the deadline-day sign-up effort, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius planned to spend much of the day Monday working out of the department's TV studio, conducting interviews by satellite with stations around the country. 
 
 Though March 31 was the last day officially to sign up, millions of people are potentially eligible for extensions granted by the administration. 
 
 Those include people who had begun enrolling by the deadline but didn't finish, perhaps because of errors, missing information or website glitches. The government says it will accept paper applications until April 7 and take as much time as necessary to handle unfinished cases on HealthCare.gov. Rules may vary in states running their own insurance marketplaces. 
 
 The administration is also offering special extensions to make up for all sorts of problems that might have kept people from getting enrolled on time: Natural disasters. Domestic abuse. Website malfunctions. Errors by insurance companies. Mistakes by application counselors. 
 
 To seek a special enrollment period, contact the federal call center, at 1-800-318-2596, or the state marketplace and explain what happened. It's on the honor system. If the extension is approved, that brings another 60 days to enroll. 
 
 Those who still don't get health insurance run the risk that the Internal Revenue Service will fine them next year for remaining uninsured. It remains to be seen how aggressively the penalties called for in the law are enforced. 
 
 Also, the new markets don't have a monopoly on health insurance. People not already covered by an employer or a government program can comply with the insurance mandate by buying a policy directly from an insurer. They'll just have to pay the full premium themselves, although in a few states there may be an exception to that rule as well. 
 
 Supporters of the law held their breath early Monday when the website was taken down. 
 
 In Oakton, Va., enrollment counselor Rachel Klein said she noticed the website was running slowly. 
 
 "We all came into it understanding that today was going to be challenging," said Klein. "We're all relieved that there's going to be a little extra time for people." 
 
 House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio said Monday that Republicans remain committed to repealing Obama's law. 
 
 ___ 
 
 Associated Press writers Connie Cass in Washington, Don Babwin in Chicago, Randall Chase in Wilmington, Del., Ramit Plushnick-Masti in Houston, Michelle Price in Salt Lake City and Carolyn Thompson in Buffalo, N.Y., contributed to this report.
– Experts didn't think the White House could reach a goal of 7 million ObamaCare signups as of yesterday—but it looks like their forecasts were wrong. Officials say the administration was on track to receive more than 7 million signups, in line with the original Congressional Budget Office target numbers. That target had earlier been shrunk to 6 million following HealthCare.gov's troubled debut, the AP notes. Still, among the 7 million, it's uncertain how many had previously lacked any coverage; it also remains to be seen how many new enrollees complete the process by actually paying their first premiums. "It's kind of the lead-up to Christmas right now, and all the last-minute shoppers are out," one health insurance marketer tells the Huffington Post of yesterday's flurry of new enrollees. The huge volume resulted in headaches and came amid site glitches, as HealthCare.gov struggled to keep up with traffic that at times topped 125,000 simultaneous visitors. The 7 million milestone is particularly impressive given the meager 26,000 the website managed to sign up in its first month, NBC News notes. Those who missed yesterday's deadline—and haven't qualified for one of nine extensions and exceptions to the rules—won't get another chance at open enrollment until November.