BAUSKA, Latvia — An unsanctioned protest over the closure of a hospital in the small Latvian town of Bauska halted cross-border traffic with Lithuania for several hours today.

Bauska residents angry about the governments plan to turn the 10,000-resident town’s only hospital into an outpatient clinic on Sept. 1. This will leave Bauska residents with the hospital in Jelgava, 55 kilometers away as their closest hospital. So a crowd of several hundred gathered on the town’s two bridges, blocking the main highway route between Riga and Vilnius for hours, creating a long back-up of traffic.

Although Bauska authorities called in police reinforcements from Riga and arrested four participants for intoxication, the protests remained peaceful.

Latvia’s Ministry of Health has not announced any changes to its plans for Bauska as a result of the protest.