The $580 Co-pay

For those in the outside world accustomed to paying $25 or more at every doctor’s visit, the idea of prisoners paying $2 to $8 to see a doctor seems nominal. Forty-two states plus the federal Bureau of Prisons charge a co-pay, according to the Prison Policy Institute, a criminal justice think tank.

When you’re making pennies an hour, or nothing at all, a small co-pay can be the equivalent of hundreds