MEXICO: A man who weighs 60 stone has left his house for the first time in five years - after shedding 28st.

Six people pushed Manuel Uribe's wheel-equipped iron bed into the street, as a band played and a crowd gathered to see the man who once weighed 88st.

"The sky is beautiful and blue and I want to enjoy the sun," Uribe said after taking a sip of champagne.

Unable to leave his bed for more than five years, Uribe has lost 28st since he began a high-protein diet a year ago.

To celebrate the event, a forklift lifted Uribe's bed on to a trailer pulled by a pick-up truck and the 41-year-old mechanic rode through the streets of San Nicolas de los Garza, a Monterrey suburb.

Dozens of reporters and photographers followed Uribe as he passed the town's plaza, waving at onlookers eager to get a glimpse of him.

Uribe was a chubby child, weighing 17st as an adolescent. In 1992 his weight began ballooning further.

Since 2002, Uribe has been bedridden, relying on his mother and friends to feed and clean him.

He pleaded for help on national television in January 2006 and an Italian and a Spanish doctor offered him gastric bypass surgery.

But Uribe instead chose to accept help from Mexican nutritionists working with the Zone diet.

He says he will stick to that diet until he reaches his goal weight of 18st.

"My goal is to leave the house on my own but it will be a long process," he said.

Doctors say it may take three to four years for Uribe to reach his goal.