Olivia moves a bit closer to death each day, and much of Europe is watching it happen, distraught but unable to turn away.
The waif-like 6-year-old, her belly swollen by a cancerous tumor the size of a beach ball, is caught in the middle of a tragic, and much publicized, tug of war.Austria's medical establishment, on one side, insists she will die without chemotherapy. Her parents, on the other, are placing their trust in a former doctor who claims that cancer is a state of mind.
Olivia's parents brought her home this week after hiding out for weeks in Switzerland and Spain but still refuse permission for chemotherapy.
Doctors discovered a small tumor on her kidney May 18. Now, more than eight weeks later, the tumor has almost filled her stomach cavity. Doctors say it is growing daily.
As the fight continues, the sad child with the huge brown eyes gets weaker.
What are Olivia's chances of survival without chemotherapy, and then an operation?
"Terrible," says Dr. Hanns Vanura, a respected pediatrician.
"Excellent," said Geerd Ryke Hamer, the former doctor on whose advice Olivia's parents rely.
Hamer, who has been barred from practicing medicine in his native Germany for his unorthodox views, claims the growing tumor is a sign of healing from a psychological conflict. He calls the tumor a "cyst" that will separate harmlessly once Olivia is healthy again. He sees the attacks on him and the girl's parents as "raw brutality" by the state, an envious medical society and the pharmaceutical industry.
Millions of Europeans watch daily as the drama unfolds. Olivia's haunting image is splashed in newspapers and on television.
"I consider what is happening to Olivia murder," said Ronald Mueller, a Vienna office worker.
After intense pressure from Vanura and other physicians, the threat of legal action, and an appeal from President Thomas Klestil, Olivia's parents, Helmut and Erika Pilhar, agreed to chemotherapy Thursday - only to forbid it again on Friday after talking with Hamer.
Austrian law permits medical treatment without parental permission, but Vanura said that option wasn't being pressed in Olivia's case. The girl is extremely close to her mother, who has refused to leave her room in a hospital in Tulln, 25 miles northwest of Vienna.
The Justice Ministry was considering legal action against Hamer, but the 59-year-old with a piercing gaze was unbowed.
"Cancer is conceived in the brain," he insisted. "That's where you have to fight it."
Interest in the case from Romania to Scandinavia is enhanced by a strong European interest in nontraditional treatments.