MANILA, Philippines—Keep your jackets handy and guard against respiratory diseases, the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration said Saturday as the mercury continued to dip during the past few days.

According to PAGASA, the minimum temperature dropped to 19.4 degrees Celsius on Friday and 19.8 degrees on Saturday. The readings were taken at PAGASA’s Science Garden in Quezon City at around 6 a.m.

While a far cry from the record of 14.5 in January of 1914, the mercury could still drop because of the persistence of the northeast monsoon, said PAGASA director Prisco Nilo.

“During this time of the year, the northeast monsoon is active and surging. Even if the northeast monsoon temporarily stops surging, the temperatures will come to around 21 degrees. That is still cold,” Nilo told the Inquirer.

The northeast monsoon is the cold wind from the northern hemisphere, particularly from Siberia and China, that comes into the country this time of the year. Nilo said the monsoon can persist until the middle of February or until the start of March.

Nilo advised the public to keep warm and watch out for respiratory diseases due to the cold weather.

According to the agency’s website, moderate to strong winds blowing from the northeast will prevail over Luzon and the eastern sections of Visayas and Mindanao. Coastal waters in these areas will be moderate to rough.

Elsewhere, winds from the northeast will be light to moderate and seas will be slight to moderate.

Also, the agency’s website said a cold front is affecting extreme northern Luzon. A cold front is the transition zone where a mass of advancing cold air displaces moist warmer air.

Because of the cold front, extreme northern Luzon will experience mostly cloudy skies with scattered light rains.

The rest of the country, including Metro Manila, will experience partly cloudy to cloudy weather with isolated rain showers and thunderstorms.

Temperatures in Metro Manila will range from 19 to 30 degrees Celsius, the agency said.

It said Tagaytay will have temperatures ranging from 19 to 24 degrees Celsius while the temprature in Baguio is expected to range from 13 to 23 degrees Celsius.