Having read the BBC report, it looks like they are making the changes in good faith, for once.
Colour me sceptical, but the diagnosis and treatment of all cancers seems rather more complex than something that can be boiled down to just three targets.
Also I be very interested to know whether the three they've kept have been selected as they are the ones with the greatest chance of being hit. And of course if you want to 'chase the target' it is easier to do with three rather than nine. And the 'chase the target' mentality can have unintended detrimental effects as something that may be really important in terms of patients may be deprioritised if not associated with a target in favour of focussing on just a tiny number of outcome measures.
And of course monkeying with the targets means it becomes impossible to compare the past with the future as you will be comparing apples with cabbages.
Notable too that the threshold seems to have been downgraded for the new diagnostic target - previously thresholds were set at 85%, now this one will be 75% - Cancer Research think this should actually be 95%, not 85%, let alone 75%.
