Effective Implementation of Children’s Right to Health and Access to Affordable Household Energy: Overview of Legal Framework in Latvia

Energy poverty is increasingly recognised as a multidimensional determinant of health, yet its implications for children remain insufficiently addressed in health, social and energy policy. This article examines access to adequate household energy as a prerequisite for the effective realisation of children’s right to health and living conditions necessary for their physical, mental and social development. Drawing on international human rights law, European Union law and relevant legal and policy frameworks, it analyses how inadequate heating, electricity insecurity, poor housing conditions and energy deprivation affect children’s health. Children experience energy poverty differently from adults due to their physiological vulnerability, dependence on caregivers and limited influence over household resources and living conditions. Exposure to cold, overheating or interrupted energy supply may exacerbate existing health and social inequalities. The article argues that sufficient household energy should be understood not merely as an issue of affordability or social assistance but as an important social determinant of health and an element of States’ positive obligations towards children. It proposes a Children’s Energy Health Rights Framework encompassing energy availability, affordability and continuity, child-sensitive vulnerability assessment and effective protection. The framework provides a rights-based foundation for developing equitable and child-sensitive responses to energy poverty.