Michael Buerk - the host of Radio 4's Moral Maze - says fat people are 'not ill' but 'weak' and the NHS should let them die.
Writing in the Radio Times the former BBC News presenter claimed the NHS could save money and society would benefit if the obese died 'a decade earlier'
Buerk wrote how the obese were fat because they 'eat too much' and the condition - which encourages people to seek treatment on the Health Service - should not be classed as a disease, writes the Mirror .
He challenged a claim by Public Health England that obesity costs the NHS £6.1 billion a year - arguing that 'VAT on takeaways, confectionery and fizzy drinks more than covers it'.
However the former BBC news presenter went further by saying 'the obese will die a decade earlier than the rest of us' and we should see it as a 'selfless sacrifice in the fight against demographic imbalance, overpopulation and climate change'.
He wrote: “Who can calculate how much an obese person would have cost if they were slim?
“How much would he or she cost if, instead of keeling over with a heart attack at 52, they live to a ripe, dementia-ridden old age, requiring decades of expensive care?
“The freedom to make bad choices is what personal autonomy, indeed democracy, is all about . . . who is to say longevity is the ultimate goal in life?
“Give them the facts to make informed decisions; by all means ‘nudge’ all you like, but in the end leave couch potatoes alone. They’re weak, not ill.”
Meanwhile, researchers say getting patients to wear fat suits could reveal medical students' prejudices against overweight and obese people.
Scientists at the University of Tuebingen, south Germany, asked trainee doctors to take an anti-fat attitudes test (AFAT) after taking part in a role play with "patients" wearing fat suits.
A total of 207 medical students took part in the study, where volunteers helped to simulate a meeting between a "family doctor" and a "patient with diabetes".
The AFAT responses, published in the British Medical Journal, showed that students harboured more negative attitudes towards obesity than either teachers or the patients.
