Entertainment> Celebrities

Depp daughter "doing much better"

(E!Online)
2007-03-09 09:18

Johnny Depp's camp has moved to tamp down reports that the star's eldest child is in a touch-and-go health battle.

"We are happy to report that their daughter is doing much better," the actor's publicist, Robin Baum, said Thursday. "The family greatly appreciates the continued support and respect of their privacy."

The statement came after London's Daily Mirror reported that Lily-Rose, Depp's seven-year-old daughter with longtime girlfriend Vanessa Paradis, was "seriously ill" at a U.K. hospital.

The newspaper said it knew what ailed the girl, said to have been hospitalized for the past nine days, but declined to publish the information or the name of the hospital "out of respect for family privacy."

Stateside, In Touch magazine reported Lily-Rose was being treated for blood poisoning contracted by stepping on a rusty nail.

The Paris-based Depp and family, including his and Paradis' youngest child, Jack, 4, are currently in London while the actor films the Broadway-originated musical Sweeney Todd for longtime director Tim Burton.

Depp, 43, is expected to be one of the stars of the summer box office with the latest Pirates of the Caribbean movie, subtitled At Worlds End. Down the road, he may star as Alexander Litvinenko, the former KGB spy who was fatally poisoned by a radioactive substance. Depp's production company recently snapped up the film rights to an upcoming book about the case.