U.S. employers facing surging costs from paying for Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy and similar obesity drugs are hiring virtual healthcare providers like Teladoc to implement weight-loss management programs, a dozen consultants, pharmacy benefit managers, analysts, and providers told Reuters. These programs may require diet and exercise before granting access to the medicines, and in some cases will become employees' sole covered option for medications like Wegovy and Eli Lilly’s rival therapy Zepbound, which have list prices of more than $1,000 a month. They could help companies cut costs by limiting employees to small networks of less expensive providers or by delaying prescriptions with lifestyle change mandates, one of the benefits consultants said.