The Disease Prevention and Control Center (SPKC) has identified all the contacts in the family - the tests show that the deadly disease has not yet been transmitted.
The four-year-old boy from Vidzeme is in intensive care. Two other children of the family are being treated in the ward. The boy's condition has been critical for seven days.
Inga Ziemele, paediatric infectologist at BKUS, said: "His condition is definitely critical, the doctors are fighting for his life and he is also in intensive care at the moment."
The boy has developed complications - it is not known which ones will last for life. Heart, kidneys - all internal organs have been affected.
Dace Zavadska, pediatrician and pediatric infectologist at BKUS, said: "Inflammation of the heart muscles, rhythm disturbances. These problems will last a lifetime. Kidney problems. Dialysis is ongoing."
SPKC specialists have identified all the contacts of this family. All of them - children and adults - have been examined. No other patients have been identified.
Meanwhile, the family has not changed its attitude towards vaccines.
Infectologist Ziemele said: "They are not ready to start vaccination. There is another child in the family, they are not ready to vaccinate him. It is absurd what this family believes."
Pediatrician Zavadska added: "Starting with the belief that vaccines are made from green monkeys and that vaccinated people change the nature of infections. Unfortunately, these decisions are made by adults who are themselves vaccinated and protected, while children suffer."
Diphtheria vaccination coverage among Latvian children is good, but revaccination should be repeated every ten years. When they learned that the children in this family had been ill, their contacts wanted to receive the booster vaccine.
Zavadska stated: "I will take this opportunity to remind everyone in Latvia that if you have forgotten to get the booster vaccine for any reason and it has been 10 years, or 20, you only need to get one dose. And live peacefully for the next 10 years."
The number of people revaccinated against diphtheria at the Latvian Infectiology Center has also increased.
"Every day there are at least around 30 people - it was not like that - who come for revaccination. And sometimes there is even a queue," noted Baiba Rozentāle, the head doctor at the Latvian Infectology Center.
Between 2007 and 2023, 122 cases of diphtheria were reported in Latvia, and ten people died.
The diphtheria vaccination is state-funded for everyone at any age. You can get it from your GP.
