Former newsreader Michael Buerk has suggested that obese people should be allowed to die early in order to save the NHS money.

The 73-year-old said those who are obese may be making a “selfless sacrifice” to stop the country being overpopulated if they die a decade earlier than the rest of the population.

Writing in Radio Times magazine, the veteran BBC presenter said that fat people are “weak, not ill”.

He said he does not believe obesity should be classed as a disease in a bid to encourage people to seek treatment and to “reduce the stigma (of) fatness”, adding that “you’re fat because you eat too much”.

Buerk also queried Public Health England’s claim that overweight and obesity-related ill-health costs the NHS £6.1bn a year.

He said: “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? (In any case, VAT on takeaways, confectionery and fizzy drinks more than covers it.)”

The former I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! star added that the “freedom to make bad choices is what personal autonomy, indeed democracy, is all about”, and asked “who is to say longevity is the ultimate goal in life?”.

He said: “Let us positively reframe the argument.

“The obese will die a decade earlier than the rest of us; see it as a selfless sacrifice in the fight against demographic imbalance, overpopulation and climate change.

“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.”

The NHS estimates that almost a third of adults in the UK are obese, and that one in five children aged 10 to 11 are obese.

Its official website states that obesity can lead to serious health conditions including type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol.

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