It has been held up as an exemplar among nations attempting to tackle Covid-19. And, according to Krisjanis Karins, Latvia's prime minister, a key reason for the Baltic state's relative success in halting the spread of the virus so far, were the "very many" early steps taken by the government - before the first death from coronavirus in the country.

In an interview with The Telegraph, Karins also sets out how he has kept many shops and other businesses open as part of a balance struck between "keeping people healthy" and "doing the least amount of damage possible" to the economy.

In Latvia, shopping centres are only closed at weekends, and businesses such as garden centres, construction shops and opticians have remained open. Such an approach is coveted by MPs concerned that this country's lockdown risks permanent damage to the economy.

Karins, 55, a US-educated former businessman, insists that the country felt "ill prepared" when the pandemic began to loom, but it quickly began to increase its stocks of personal protective equipment for medics and its ability to carry out widespread testing of the population.

"The first person died in our country on April 3. And maybe that is one of the big differences, that we took very many preliminary steps, before we were seeing people dying," Karins says, in an interview conducted over Zoom, the video conferencing software now being used for a significant amount of government business. "And the second thing, [from] the very outset, we followed the epidemiologists. They are the ones giving the advice and we listened to them."

In the UK too, ministers have been at pains to stress that at every stage they have been guided by the advice of the experts. But Latvia declared a state of emergency over Covid-19 as early as March 13, a pronouncement which included a ban on all public gatherings of more than 200 people. At the same time, tens of thousands attended the Cheltenham racing festival despite warnings that the event could facilitate significant spreading of the new virus, after it was first recorded in Britain on Jan 31.

By the time of the first Covid-19 related death in Latvia, the limit on public gatherings had dropped from crowds of 200 to groups of two, and strict social distancing rules were in place.

"In retrospect we actually shut everything down, went to two people, and two metres, before we even had our first confirmed death of Covid-19," Karins says. But the majority of businesses were allowed to remain open, with the exception of cinemas and theatres.