A new Youtube campaign designed to highlight the grim reality of inactivity has been launched to coincide with National Obesity Awareness Week.

Lesley Miller – the fictional crisp-chomping poster boy of inactivity – is the star of the short film. He urges a group of ailing onlookers to reject the fitness ‘myth’ and join his ‘herd’ of sofa slobs.

“My name’s Lesley Miller, and I haven’t been to a gym for five years,” he proudly tells his audience in a dank village hall.

“I have chosen to enjoy, not energise. To wallow in the easy, rather than strive for so-called self improvement.”

The evocative video, which has so far garnered nearly 6,000 views, has been produced by Les Mills as part of an innovative campaign to get Britons moving. At the end of the video, users are given two options to click on: ‘Choose the right to be active,’ which leads to a Les Mills promo video; or ‘Choose the right to do nothing,’ which leads to a clip of Lesley watching TV and eating junk food.

Results from a recent Les Mills survey found a fifth of UK adults stated they rarely exercised, while eight per cent said they never exercised at all. Laziness, lack of motivation and intimidation of the gym environment were the main reasons people gave for choosing inactivity, prompting Les Mills to highlight the consequences.

“Traditional marketing approaches promoting a healthy lifestyle, such as archetypal gym videos and work-out DVDs have failed to extinguish the apathy of the masses. So we decided to change tact to get Britain moving,” said Les Mills UK head trainer Dave Kyle.

“We want people to stop sticking their heads in the sand over their health, and to ensure we don’t turn into a nation of Lesley Millers. If we need to use shock tactics to make Britain wake up, we will.”