BREAKING: GM Health-Care Pain Spreads

It was bound to happen. General Motors(GM Quote) will be announcing to the salaried employees that they too will share the pain of changes to the health care provided by the company, starting January 1.

The announcement, confirmed by GM spokesperson Deborah Silverman, is due today -- just weeks after the company stunned the salaried retirees with the cancellation of health-care benefits for people 65 and over.

This can't be entirely unexpected for the 36,400 remaining salaried employees, who are also awaiting further details of the cuts to their numbers announced at the infamous July 15 press conference.

Employees will receive the news by email sometime later today. Silverman would not comment on the contents, as she said it's an internal, confidential email for employees only.

However, TheStreet.com Ratings was able to review a list of many of the intended changes provided by a person familiar with the situation. Here are some of the alterations on that list.

The increase doubles retail co-pays for generic drugs to $10, and raises it between $3 and $5 for preferred brands. Mail-order co-pays are doubled, up $10 for generics, up $5 for preferred brands and up a whopping $25 for non-preferred brands.

Vision is not excluded from the pain, with a tripling of the monthly contribution for a family to $9 per month.

Dependent children will no longer qualify for GM health care beyond the end of the year in which they turn 24 years old. Coverage will be available through COBRA in these cases, which is a legal requirement in any case, and allows a person to pay the full cost of coverage plus a maximum of 2% to maintain health care for an 18-month period.