US: Dana Reeve, who won worldwide admiration for her devotion to her actor husband, Christopher, through his decade of near-total paralysis, has died of lung cancer in New York.
Reeve (44), a singer and actress, succeeded her husband as chair of the Christopher Reeve Foundation, which funded research into spinal cord paralysis.
Kathy Lewis, president of the foundation, visited Reeve in hospital last Friday and said she was "tired but with her typical sense of humour and smile, always trying to make other people feel good, her characteristic personality".
"She was a woman with an incredible heart who really put herself out there to help people with disabilities and especially those who are caregivers - something she knew a lot about," Ms Lewis said.
Christopher Reeve, star of Hollywood's Superman movies, became an activist for spinal cord research after a horse-riding accident paralysed him in 1995. He died on October 10th, 2004. The couple had a 13-year-old son, Will, and Dana Reeve had two adult stepchildren, Matthew and Alexandra.