The United Nations has donated $100,000 to aid Ukraine's homeless after over 150 people, many of them homeless, died during a severe cold spell, KyivPost informs.    

U.N. spokeswoman Viktoria Andriyevska said Tuesday the money will be spent on warm clothing, food and heating centers.

Ukraine has been hit hard by a spell of severe cold earlier this month that has claimed 151 lives and left nearly 4,000 hospitalized with hypothermia and frostbite as temperatures plunged to minus 30 degrees Celsius (minus 22 degrees Fahrenheit).

Emergency officials say in 90 percent of cases the victims died because they were under the influence of alcohol.

Experts say the problem has highlighted this ex-Soviet republic's inability and unwillingness to deal with homeless people.