Latvia’s government to lift part of Covid-19 restrictions, including late evening curfew

From next Monday onward –15 November – Latvia will lift several existing Covid-19 restrictions, as decided by the government on Tuesday, 9 November.
The Cabinet of Ministers has added amendments to the order on the state of emergency provide for the preservation of the requirement for all face-to-face services to be provided only in «green regime». This does not apply to critically important services, however.
The government has also decided to lift the curfew.
As for stores: to prevent the situation when it is not possible to adequately separate the flows of people coming in and going out, it is decided that all large stores, including stores that sell food and stores that sell hygiene products with a total shopping area exceeding 1 500 m2, will provide services only in green regime.
Resident are allowed to purchase only goods of first necessity in the unsafe environment. Supermarkets will not be allowed to operate on weekends.
Amendments also state that face-to-face teaching process will resume at schools from 15 November onward.
In primary education it will be necessary to ensure there is no overlap between students from different classes. It is permitted to compose groups of students from the same school. At the same time, it is necessary to make sure the composition of those groups does not change.
Another exception will apply to 11th and 12th graders. As part of their education process they sometimes have to overlap with students from other classes. The reason is because some in-depth courses are not possible to be implemented in each class separately. Similar exceptions are in place for vocational education.
Education facilities are required to stick to the «bubble» principle at cafeterias as well. If it is not possible, the education facility should come up with a lunch schedule for each class.
Additionally, until now regulations stated that face-to-face education of adults is to be performed only in an epidemiologically safe or partially safe environment.
The new amendments state that adult education – both formal and informal, as well as all kinds of educational activities – is to be performed only in an epidemiologically safe environment. This means only people who have a valid Covid-19 vaccination or recovery certificate are allowed to participate.
As for sports, once the lockdown is over, the requirements that were in place between 11th and 20th October will remain in force. The requirement for epidemiologically safe practice will extend to Latvian national teams, juniors included, Latvian Olympics teams and Latvian Paralympic teams, and other team-based activities.
The only exception when it comes to sports activities in a partially safe environment will remain for international sports events.
Sports practice participants will need to be provided at least 15 m2 safe area during said practice sessions.
In order to see if it is possible to allow more freedom with indoors sports practice for children under the age of 12 years, the Ministry of Education and Science together with sports federations plans to launch a number of pilot projects for ice hockey, figure skating and indoor swimming.
As previously reported, tight epidemiological restrictions are imposed in Latvia until 15 November.