The latest White House medical reveals that the president’s BMI has tipped into the obese category. Well, he does like to act from his gut

Name: Donald Trump’s waistline.

Age: 72.

Appearance: Significant.

Significant because it is attached to the world’s most powerful man? No, significant because it’s enormous. Trump, it has just been announced, is obese.

He is? He is. The results of his physical were quietly released on Thursday, and it has revealed that he weighs 243lb.

I don’t know what that means. It means he weighs 110kg. It means he weighs more than 17 stone.

And that makes him obese? Just about. Trump claims to be 6ft 3in tall, and if that’s the case, it means he has a BMI of 30.4. Officially, anything over 30 qualifies as obese.

Isn’t BMI a flawed system? Of course it is. It’s a crude calculation of weight divided by height squared, but it doesn’t take into consideration what that weight consists of. For example, Daniel Craig’s BMI technically makes him overweight, even though he is essentially just a very muscular clothes hanger.

So you’re saying that Trump might be ripped beyond belief? He might. Who am I to know?

The same Donald Trump who binges on fast food and drinks up to a dozen Diet Cokes a day? OK, fine, yes, I’ve seen the golfing photos, too. Trump does often look like a sentient wad of cholesterol come to life to wreak havoc on the world.

So is Trump the fattest president ever? Not even close. Grover Cleveland had a BMI of 34.6, and William Taft’s BMI was 42.3. Taft was rumoured to have got stuck in the presidential bathtub.

Wow. But, hey, it’s still early days. Trump loves fast food in all its forms – remember that giant mound of cold burgers he served during the shutdown? And don’t forget that he is still going to be president for the next two years. He can catch up.

Oh God, don’t say that. Fine then. The next six years.

Nevertheless, it’s a shocking decline. Shocking? How so?

Didn’t a doctor proclaim in 2015 that Trump was unequivocally “the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency”? Ah yes, that was Harold Bornstein, who later claimed that Trump dictated those words to him.

I’m uncomfortable about the tone of this article. Because you think that gloating about someone else’s appearance is unseemly?

Yes. Well, it is. But then again Trump called Alicia Machado, the winner of the 1996 Miss Universe pageant, “Miss Piggy” because she had gained weight, and you could fit about six of her into his frame.

Do say: “Donald Trump has a weight problem.”

Don’t say: “Make America fit into its trousers again.”