There are so many flaws in this article concerning health care costs, but since other people are pointing some of those out, and for the sake of brevity I will limit my comments to a flaw via ommission. Unhealthy lifestyles are correlated with environmental impacts, here are two simple examples: fast food consumption and increased vehicle use. Fast food, via its dependence on fossil fueled factory farms, is an environmental nightmare. Sugar production as well puts a heavy strain on the environment (the Florida Everglades can attest to this). Obese people also rely on vechiles more than the non-obese, how many times do you see an obese person running errands on a bicycle or on foot? Additionally they tend to pick larger vehicles since more fuel effecient models are not spacious enought to accomadet them - if you look at the rise of SUVs in the 80s and 90s, it mirrors the growing obesity problem.

And you base this analysis on what? How many fat people seen on a bicycle? How many AMERICANs do you see on bicycles?

Do they provide the weight of people who buy SUVs? So how do you know that obese people buy SUVs? I think there is a stronger correlation between income levels and SUV purchase.

Overweight people have enough discrimination to deal with. They don't need to be saddled with blame for environmental damage as well.

And, commenting on the article regarding the productivity of the overweight, I know plenty of lazy, thin people.

It amuses me greatly that the "research" of the people citing supposed flaws in this article is about as specious as it gets.