Deborah Spangler of Renfrew died on Sept. 10 of H1N1 virus with complications from a bacterial infection, former Allegheny County Coroner Dr. Cyril Wecht said yesterday.

"This is a 45-year-old woman in perfectly good health," he said at a news conference with Bruce Dixon, Allegheny County Health Department director, set up to discuss the swine flu case.

"And that is the significance of this case -- that a healthy person with no predisposing conditions such as a chronic respiratory problem, a heart problem, or a woman who was pregnant ... that this can occur and can lead to death."

Dr. Wecht, who did a private autopsy at the request of the family, also expressed concern people have avoided the Spangler family in their Butler County home town, a reaction he called "unfair" and without scientific basis. He said Mrs. Spangler's widower and two grown daughters have not contracted H1N1.

"I won't characterize this as a benign form of non-benevolent ostrascization, but it has been tantamount to that in some respects within their community: 'Oh my god, Mrs. Spangler died of swine flu. How do we know what her family's carrying around?' ... It's almost a kind of shunning, an empathetic one, but nevertheless a shunning.

"I think this is absolutely absurd, not to mention unfair. Scientifically it has no basis."

The Spangler family could not be reached yesterday for comment.

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