BEIJING (AP) -- Chinese officials have distributed thousands of tons of flour and warm clothes and blankets to tens of thousands of Tibetan nomads threatened by their harshest winter in decades.

The freezing weather in Yushu prefecture -- a county high on the rugged Tibetan plateau -- has killed thousands of yaks and sheep that provide the nomads with food and hides for tents.

The relief organization Doctors Without Borders said in March that some 80,000 Tibetans were in danger of starving and freezing to death. It said the extreme cold froze medicine, making it unusable, and nearly 30,000 people were suffering from frostbite or snow blindness.

The China's People's Daily newspaper said Wednesday that by March 31, 1.08 million farm animals had died and more were dying every day.

The Chinese air force has delivered food and fuel, and more than $1.2 million in relief has been collected at home and abroad, the newspaper said.

More than 22 million pounds of barley and flour, 120,000 sets of cotton-padded clothes and 26,000 woolen blankets have been distributed, it said.