Health insurance for first few weeks for immigrant parents?

I am a naturalized US citizen living in California bringing my parents (70m, 66f) to the US to live with me and take care of them as my dad had a health event a few years ago that left him disabled. They have received their immigrant visas and will travel with me to the US in a week.

Parents are retired and not eligible to purchase Medicare yet (due to the 5 year rule) and also not eligible at this time for MediCal due to their financial situation (savings / assets are above the maximums for eligibility). So it would seem Covered CA / Obamacare is their best option.

However, my attempts to sign my parents up for a plan on Covered CA have resulted in not being able to verify their identity. When I called the call center, the agent said to work with a local counselor in CA (anyone have experience with this?) but also being told that coverage cannot begin until the 1st of the month after they apply.

We plan to travel to the US on Sunday (Mar/12) which would mean potentially going a few weeks without coverage until coverage can kick in on Apr/1. Any suggestions for how to get at least some kind of catastrophic coverage for my parents (both have pre-existing conditions) prior to arriving in the US for the first few weeks before they can get an ACA plan?

submitted by /u/Chance_Economist8684
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