Initially, Section 4.1, paragraph six of the Patients’ Rights Law provides that a patient may refuse information about his health orally, in writing, or by unequivocal conduct, and the medical practitioner must document such choice.
Section 6, paragraph one of the Patients’ Rights Law permits treatment only after the patient’s informed consent; accordingly, therapy in respect of which the patient does not even know the diagnosis jeopardises the principle of informed consent.
Viktors, who has been diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer, knows nothing about his diagnosis himself: the information is being withheld from him by his own children, and the hospital physician only questioned this orally. Legally, this means that the direction of the flow of information is determined not by the family, but by the patient himself: either he has refused to receive the information, or it must be provided to him. Section 4.1, paragraph one of the Patients’ Rights Law grants the patient the right to receive timely information about his health, and the attending physician may postpone this only where the physician reasonably anticipates that immediate disclosure would substantially endanger the life or health of the patient or other persons; even then, the information must be provided as soon as possible. The family’s decision “not to tell either father or mother” does not, in itself, constitute any source of legal authority: relatives have no general right to block information that belongs to the patient by law. The issue highlighted by this case is therefore whether there is a lawful mechanism by which the diagnosis may lawfully be concealed; that mechanism is only the patient’s own refusal to receive information or his authorisation of another person.
Section 4.1, paragraph six of the Patients’ Rights Law permits a patient to refuse information about his health, orally, in writing, or by conduct that unequivocally confirms such refusal, and the medical practitioner must document that choice. The refusal is valid even if the information would be distressing; the only exception is where disclosure is necessary to protect another person’s life. In practice, this means that if Viktors had expressed such a refusal, or if the family had caused him to express it, the physician’s silence would be lawful and documentable. Without that, a physician who knows the diagnosis is left only with the postponement mechanism under Section 4.1, paragraph one, together with the duty to inform as soon as the anticipated danger no longer exists. The second lawful route is Section 4.1, paragraph seven: the patient himself designates the person who is to make treatment-related decisions on his behalf and the person who is not entitled to receive information about him. Viktors has not done so; therefore, the children’s “agreement” is factual, not legal, authorisation. The third aspect is treatment: under Section 6, paragraph one of the Patients’ Rights Law, treatment is permissible only after the patient’s informed consent, and Section 6, paragraph five imposes on the physician a duty to inform the patient of the consequences of refusal. If supportive therapy is being administered without explaining to the patient what he is being treated for, the principle of informed consent is jeopardised: consent to “treatment of a serious lung disease” is not full informed consent to treatment in respect of an oncological diagnosis. It should also be noted that, absent authorisation, the role of relatives is limited: in the context of Section 12 of the Patients’ Rights Law, a person representing the patient in making a treatment decision must observe the patient’s previously expressed wishes, and if relatives with equal rights cannot agree, the decision is made by a council of physicians. This confirms that the family’s decision is not an autonomous source of authority, but is derived from the patient’s will or from the competence of the council. Hospice and palliative care services are lawfully available within this framework: Section 5, paragraph one guarantees the right to treatment appropriate to the patient’s state of health, while Section 5, paragraph five guarantees the right to continuous treatment from all institutions involved, and a referral may also be made by a general practitioner.
In practical terms, several scenarios follow for this family and for families in similar situations:
The streaming platform levy, or the obligation to invest at least 3.5% of revenues generated in Latvia in the creation of local content, is not yet a provision in force; it is a draft amendment that the Saeima committee has supported only for the final reading. The Prime Minister’s position makes the draft politically contested, but legally the legislative outcome is determined by the Saeima, not the Government. The position relevant to the reader is as follows: for the time being, platforms remain subject to the existing regime without any investment obligation, while producers remain subject to the existing public funding system, which is based on a budget grant. The specific legal issue is whether audiovisual service providers registered abroad may be subjected at all to a financial investment obligation for the creation of Latvian content, and how such an obligation would fit within the system of the Film Law and the Electronic Mass Media Law. Section 2 of the Film Law states the purpose of the law: to ensure the development of the film sector by supporting the production, distribution, preservation and accessibility of Latvian films. The alternative proposed by the Prime Minister, “budget support for the film industry”, is already legally part of this system: Section 1 of the Film Law defines public funding as state budget funds allocated to film-sector projects through a competition procedure. Accordingly, the debate is not about inventing a new support instrument, but about whether the source of funding will be the state budget or a share of platform revenues.
The existing regulatory framework already imposes content obligations on audiovisual service providers, so an investment obligation would be a quantitative step rather than a fundamentally new one.
First scenario: the Saeima adopts the amendments.
Until the Saeima approves the amendments, platforms have no obligation to pay 3.5% or acquire distribution rights; such an obligation could arise only by law.
Section 11 of the Film Law provides for state co-financing administered by LIAA for foreign film production in Latvia, subject to a projected increase in tax revenues for the state budget.
The persons and industries involved in this matter are awaiting not a new sanction, but a turn in the legislative process: uncertainty, triggered by the Prime Minister’s public position, as to the fate of amendments already progressing through the Saeima. The newsworthy fact is the Prime Minister’s statement of 6 October calling for the abandonment of a levy that would require platforms to invest 3.5% of their revenues earned in Latvia in the previous year into local content, generating EUR 600,000 to EUR 1 million annually for the sector. The immediate legal issue is twofold: first, whether and by what procedure the Saeima may abandon or defer a bill already approved in committee; and second, what obligations streaming platforms already have under existing legislation. The sources provided do not contain the substance of the amendments concerning the 3.5% contribution, so their content can be assessed only by reference to the parameters mentioned in the news report, not by reference to the legislative text. The existing framework, by contrast, is set out in the Film Law and the Electronic Mass Media Law: Section 2 of the Film Law defines the purpose of the law as supporting the production and distribution of Latvian films; Section 10 sets out the competence of the National Film Centre to administer public funding; and Section 11 concerns co-financing for foreign film production in Latvia. Platform content obligations are governed by Section 23.5 of the Electronic Mass Media Law and by the requirement that catalogues of audiovisual service providers include at least 30% European audiovisual works.
On the legislative side, no decision has yet been made: the decision of a Saeima committee to advance the amendments for an expedited vote is a procedural step, not a norm that has entered into force, and the Prime Minister’s position does not legally repeal anything, because the levy does not yet exist. Until the Saeima approves the amendments, platforms such as “Netflix”, “Go3”, “Tet”, “Disney+” and others have no obligation to pay 3.5% or acquire distribution rights; such an obligation could arise only by law. The existing requirements applicable to platforms are of a different nature: Section 23.5, paragraph one, of the Electronic Mass Media Law requires the National Electronic Mass Media Council to assess whether a service corresponds to the nature of a video-sharing platform, and catalogues of on-demand audiovisual services must include at least 30% European audiovisual works. Providers of platforms established abroad are also brought within Latvian regulation if they have a parent or subsidiary company established in Latvia (Section 23.5, paragraph two, of the Electronic Mass Media Law). The sectoral support mechanism into which levy funds could potentially flow is already operating: under Section 10, paragraph two, of the Film Law, the National Film Centre administers and allocates public funding through competitions, maintains the register of film producers, and monitors the use of funding. Public funding may be received only by a registered producer, and if funds are not used in accordance with the contract, the awarding authority recovers them (Section 8, paragraphs three and four, of the Film Law). The Prime Minister’s argument concerning relations with the United States also engages Section 11 of the Film Law, which provides for state budget co-financing administered by LIAA for foreign film production in Latvia, subject to a projected increase in tax revenues; this is the existing instrument for attracting foreign producers, independent of the proposed levy. A formal forum for dialogue between the Ministry of Culture and the sector is provided by Section 12 of the Film Law, under which the Latvian Film Council advises on sectoral strategy and issues opinions, with its operations ensured by the Ministry of Culture. The sources provided do not reflect any case law on this issue, and it therefore cannot be cited.
In practical terms, developments in the near future will unfold in the Saeima, not in the ministries:
Can the state make the model curricula for subjects prescribed by the state in basic education mandatory, while preserving schools’ right to develop their own author programmes, and what would be the legal basis for such regulation in education legislation?
There is no specific excerpt from a legal provision on this point, so I rely on general principles of law, which I expressly identify. Within the structure of the Education Law and the General Education Law, model curricula for subjects have traditionally formed part of the regulatory framework governing educational content, approved by the Minister for Education and Science. Changing their status to “state-prescribed and mandatorily applicable” models would essentially mean a shift from recommendatory guidance to mandatory regulation.
The compromise reflected in the report — mandatory content and learning outcomes, while allowing author programmes if the content is included in full — is consistent with the principle of proportionality: the state’s objective, namely uniform educational content, is achieved while limiting schools’ pedagogical freedom as little as possible. The development of a family values and health literacy module in consultation with social partners by 30 April 2027, and the updating of model curricula from 1 September 2027, constitute an administrative regulatory process whose final legal force will depend on the precise wording of the relevant Cabinet regulations.
In practice, this means that school management and teachers currently planning the 2027/2028 school year cannot rely on the existing freedom to design programmes at their discretion. Author programmes will remain permissible only as an exception, requiring the full inclusion of state-prescribed content, which schools will need to be able to demonstrate in the event of institutional accreditation or state inspection. The undertaking mentioned in the report to ensure that lessons actually delivered correspond to the teaching plan and that the learning process continues uninterrupted during state examinations points to intensified state oversight of the actual implementation of the teaching process, not merely documentary compliance.
LIZDA’s objections to the “Teen Star” programme and its call to exclude family health education indicate that the content of the module is not yet final and may be amended during the consultation process up to 30 April 2027. This is the stage at which social partners may submit specific proposals or objections. Further attention should be paid to the education content expert council to be established by December 2026, and to the proposals to be prepared by the Ministry of Education and Science and the State Education Development Agency by the end of 2027 concerning changes to the number of teaching hours and the integration of subjects, as these will be the first documents in which the concrete wording of the mandatory regulation will become visible.
If any person had committed an administrative offence, the grounds for liability and the procedure would be determined by Section 2 of the Administrative Liability Law, which leaves the establishment of specific offences to sector-specific legislation or binding municipal regulations.
For participants in proceedings who disrupt the examination of a case, Sections 65 and 66 allow for a reprimand, removal from the premises, or coercive monetary payment.
The persons mentioned in this account — voters who caused conflicts at polling stations and members of electoral commissions — currently face no expected sanction, as the incidents described in the report are properly characterized as misunderstandings rather than established violations. The factual legal position is that the Aizkraukle Municipality Election Commission submitted the results in accordance with the procedure prescribed by law, and a four-hour delay in vote counting does not, in itself, give rise to liability on the basis of the sources provided. The real legal issue concerns the conflicts recorded at polling stations: if any person had committed an administrative offence, the grounds for liability and the procedure would be determined by Section 2 of the Administrative Liability Law, which makes the general provisions, types of penalties, and procedural rules applicable only where a sector-specific law or binding municipal regulation establishes the relevant offence. The sources do not identify a specific electoral offence, and therefore the imposition of a specific penalty in this account is not currently justified.
If, nevertheless, any of the conflicts described were to be classified as an administrative offence, the applicable framework would operate as follows. Section 14 of the Administrative Liability Law provides for four types of penalties: a warning and a fine as principal penalties, and deprivation of rights and a prohibition on exercising rights as supplementary penalties. The latter, according to the visible part of Section 18, may be prescribed only by law and for a period from one month to two years. The amount of a fine, as provided in Section 16, is expressed in fine units, and the decision must state both the number of units and the amount in euros; the sources do not provide a specific amount for this case. In selecting the type and measure of penalty, Section 19 refers to the nature of the offence, the personality of the person, their financial circumstances, and mitigating circumstances. Section 20 recognizes confession and remorse, or voluntary compensation for loss, as mitigating circumstances, which could be relevant for a voter involved in a conflict.
The most practically significant further developments concern not penalties, but the entry into force of the election results and the positions of the parties. The Union of Greens and Farmers’ failure to pass the 5% national threshold means that it remains outside the Saeima, even though its support in Aizkraukle Municipality exceeded that threshold. For the “United List,” with 35.28% nationally and 39.63% in the municipality, the allocation of seats follows according to the number of votes received. The commission chair’s criticism of the possibility of changing one’s vote — 746 corrected cases, or 0.05% — is a legally neutral opinion; the sources contain no rule restricting that possibility. The most important point for the reader of this report is that no penalty proceedings have been initiated against any of the conflict participants mentioned in the account, and the sources provide no basis for predicting such proceedings.