Four board members of an obesity charity have quit following the publication of a report that advised overweight people to stop counting calories and eat more fat.

The controversial report was published in May on the website of the Public Health Collaboration, bearing the branding of the charity National Obesity Forum (NOF).

But NOF board members were not given the opportunity to approve the paper, except for its chair - and the report's co-author - Dr David Haslam, according to the Observer newspaper.

The Guardian reported on Friday that four of the seven board members have resigned, while a fifth is currently considering his options.

Matt Capehorn, the charity’s clinical director and one of the trustees to resign last week, told the newspaper a press release was sent out about the paper, without board members having seen it or had any input into it first.

Capehorn said the document was misleading as it presented itself as an NOF document.

“It is very misleading because it gives that document an air of authority,” he said.

Other trustees to resign, include diabetes nurse Deborah Cook, clinical psychologist Jen Nash, and obstetrician and gynaecologist Sangeeta Agnihotri.

Capehorn told the Guardian that Haslam had previously emailed board members suggesting they would be given the chance to view the document before it was finalised. But that did not happen, he said.  

The report Eat Fat, Cut the Carbs and Avoid Snacking to Reverse Obesity and Type 2 Diabetes was never published on the forum’s own website but appears on website of the Public Health Collaboration. The paper bears a large NOF logo on its front page.

Requests for comment by NOF chair Haslam and a spokeswoman remained unanswered this morning.

The charity was founded in 2000 to raise awareness of obesity in the UK and promote ways for it to be addressed. Its last reported income was £1,814 while its expenditure for the year ending 31 October 2014 was just £819.