A HEREFORD woman died on her way to pick up the morning paper, an inquest heard today.

Ann Shaw, 72, was making her way from her home in Beattie Avenue, Hunderton, to the newsagents at The Oval when she collapsed near the pelican crossing on Belmont Road on January 24.

Passers-by began CPR and Mrs Shaw was taken to Hereford County Hospital by ambulance in cardiac arrest, but her death was confirmed a short while later.

Describing his late wife as a very sociable, community-spirited member of many committees and clubs, husband Phillip Shaw said she would walk to the shop every morning to buy the daily paper.

She would often stop and chat with the neighbours on her way to the shop, and had seemed her normal self on the morning of her death.

"We had our breakfast together that morning, and she seemed fine," Mr Shaw said.

"She left at about 9am, and several neighbours told me that she had waved at them as she passed them that morning."

A post mortem examination revealed that Mrs Shaw was suffering from moderate pulmonary oedema at the time of her death.

She also had chronic pericarditis and kidney disease, but neither of these were thought to have caused the pulmonary oedema, and a post mortem report concluded that she had died from an unascertained cause.

Assistant coroner for Herefordshire, Roland Wooderson, concluded that Mrs Shaw had some age-related conditions, but was in relatively good health.

He concluded that the cause of her death remained unascertained and recorded a natural death verdict.