Today's Globe: chemo-delay case, Dominican clinic, West Nile virus, EU healthcare, health data

The Department of Social Services investigated the parents of cancer-stricken Jeremy Fraser four times since 2005, but officials said yesterday that the agency only substantiated child abuse allegations in February, after doctors discovered that the boy's cancer had returned because his mother had allegedly failed to get him medical care.

Dr. Kim Wilson wondered why so many of her Dominican patients at the Martha Eliot Health Center in Jamaica Plain seemed to have disabilities or chronic illnesses that could have been prevented or better treated earlier in their lives. After a visit to the town where many had roots, she and an entrepreneur from Wayland formed a nonprofit to boost infant and maternal survival rates by training of local Dominican doctors and nurses and funding a corps of community health workers who would go on to train others.

State public health officials are warning residents to take precautions after mosquitoes infected with West Nile virus were found Friday in a pool in Worcester (fifth item).

European Union citizens will be able to receive most healthcare treatment anywhere in the 27-nation bloc without getting prior authorization under a long-awaited draft law published yesterday.

"Private companies are taking the lead on electronic health records because of the failure of many US healthcare providers to embrace the Internet," a Globe editorial says. "A system should be in place that, subject to patient approval, would speed records from physicians' offices to hospitals or anyplace a person needs care."