Kurigram: Even of late, the shivering cold has hit the country’s northern district hard, disrupting the normal life.

The Met Office recorded the temperature of 5.0 degrees Celsius, the lowest in the country and also the lowest of the season, in Rajarhat upazila on Sunday, said weather official Abdur Rahman.

The working people were said to be the worst affected ones as they could not show up in their workplaces due to the extreme cold.  Many poor people were also suffering for lack of warm clothes.

‘I’ve never seen such extreme cold in recent years. More worrying, we don’t have any warm cloth,’ said Basiran Bewa, an elderly woman of sadar upazila.

Meanwhile, many people, mostly children and elderly ones, have been admitted to different hospitals of the district with cold-related diseases like pneumonia, cough and respiratory problems, including Asthma.

Some 216 patients, suffering from cold-related problems, were admitted to Sadar Hospital in the last 24 hours alone, said its resident medical officer Dr Shahinur Rahman.

Shahinur said they were struggling to cope with the growing number of patients as the hospital is understaffed.

Deputy Commissioner M Nurul Amin said the district administration has so far distributed some 53,000 blankets among poor people since the winter set in.