Woman drowns at Yellowstone

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK -- A 30-year-old woman has drowned in a backcountry river in the southwest corner of Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming.

The National Park Service says Heidi Llewellyn Smith, of Jackson, drowned Thursday in the Bechler River near a backcountry campsite.

She was one of a party of four staying at the Bechler Ford campsite.

The Park Service says the woman told others that she felt ill and went swimming. A friend later found her under four feet of water against a log.

Smith was declared dead at the scene.

The incident remains under investigation.

It is the first accidental death in the park this year, and the first drowning since September 2007.

Man dies of West Nile virus

CHEYENNE -- A Washakie County man has died from West Nile virus -- the state's first reported fatality from the disease this year.

The Wyoming Department of Health announced Friday the man had been hospitalized before he died this week. The department declined to identify the man.

Seven cases of the virus have been reported to the health department this year. There have been two cases in Platte county and one each in Campbell, Converse, Fremont, Goshen and Washakie counties.

Mosquitoes spread the virus when they feed on infected birds and then bite people or other animals.

"Wyoming residents need to recognize that West Nile infection can, at times, become a very serious health threat," said Dr. Tracy Murphy, state epidemiologist. "Everyone should do what they can to protect themselves and others from mosquito bites."

The health department reported that most people infected with the disease never develop symptoms.

Symptoms for those who do become ill include fever, headache, body aches, skin rash and swollen lymph nodes. Some people infected with the disease develop West Nile neuroinvasive disease, meaning meningitis or encephalitis. Symptoms of the neuroinvasive disease include coma, tremors, convulsions and paralysis.

Wyoming saw 10 human West Nile virus cases last year with no deaths reported. There were 185 human cases with two deaths in 2007; 65 human cases with two deaths in 2006; 12 human cases with two deaths in 2005; 10 human cases with no deaths in 2004; 393 human cases with nine deaths in 2003; and two human cases with no deaths in 2002.

Event honors woman's vote

LARAMIE -- The Laramie Foundation will celebrate women's suffrage in Wyoming with a reenactment of Louisa Swain's historic 1870 vote.

State Auditor Rita Meyer will re-enact Swain's vote this morning at Johnson, Lummis, Hunkins Women's Plaza. U.S. Rep. Cynthia Lummis and U.S. Sen. Mike Enzi will also speak.

Wyoming's territorial Legislature in 1869 passed the first law in the United States giving women equal voting rights as men, according to the foundation. Swain became the first woman to vote in a general election on Sept. 6, 1870.

Both chambers of the U.S. Congress approved resolutions in 2008 recognizing Sept. 6 as Louisa Swain Day.