(BPT) - After Carol Vanderploeg’s family experienced a double-job loss last spring; she worried about affording the $1,300 average monthly cost of her husband’s epilepsy prescriptions.
The couple only had enough pills to last a few months when they moved to Augusta, Ga., in search of new jobs. Even after finding another job at Delta Air Lines, the potentially high refill cost kept Vanderploeg apprehensive.
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