NASTIE, Nice, Monday (NNN) — The Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI) has poured scorn on Prof Sir Michael Rawlins of the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) after he accused them of profiteering on drugs.

“I am shocked, shocked — oh, my cheque? Thank you! — at the notion they could be profiteering on drugs,” said Stephen Pollard of completely independent thinktank Centre for the New Europe. “As well as saving lives, drug companies eliminated communism and brought the downfall of the North Korean dictatorship, entirely through the marketing of little blue pills guaranteed to give you an erection. Research budgets are up to nearly half the marketing budgets, giving humanity such boons as V1k@grk@, Rogaine, Spanish Fly — the list is endless.”

Professor Rawlins stridently maintained his position that the “postcode lottery” for cancer treatments, where any patient with a letter or number in their postcode gets nothing, was not their doing. “It was the drug companies’ prices that killed all those cancer patients! Them! Them! Not us!”

NICE’s approach attempts to deal with the problem at the heart of the NHS: patients and their need for care, which can seriously affect waiting times for managerial bonuses and privately-funded infrastructure subsidies. Local doctors will be reducing levels of service and berating and belittling patients who refuse to cease unhealthy habits such as buying food they can afford, living in a city or being too poor to pay for BUPA. Viagra remains, of course, available free on the NHS.

THE LAB, Transylvania, Saturday (NotScientist) — Prince Charles must prove his claim that GM crops could cause a global environmental disaster, Environment Minister Phil Woolas has challenged.

Mr Woolas said it was the government’s “moral responsibility” to investigate whether genetically modified crops, fully owned and patented to the hilt by Monsanto, could help provide a suitably profitable solution to hunger in the developing world. Monsanto famously protect their hard work, having sued and won for patent violation when their seeds have blown onto another farmer’s land.

“We see this as part of our Africa strategy,” he said. “It’s easy for those of us with plentiful food supplies to ignore the issue, but we have a responsibility to use science to get our hooks into the less well off where we can. We certainly wouldn’t drive them off their land, they’re too useful to us as labour. It’s in their own best interest. I think of it as the ‘Corporate Man’s Burden.'”

Nestlé has also urged the European Union to review its opposition to GM. “People are starting to think Monsanto are a bigger bunch of bastards than we are, and we can’t have such strikes against our public image go unchallenged.”