Amaravati, Sep 8 (IANS): The Andhra Pradesh health department will personally contact and persuade people who recovered from Covid-19 to donate plasma to save lives.

"The health department call centre will call the recovered patients and tell them about the plasma donation programme and convince them to donate plasma to save other people's lives," said Health Commissioner Katamneni Bhaskar.

The department has readied a list of 37,000 people who beat the disease, making them eligible to donate plasma for critical Covid patients.

"The database of eligible donors has been prepared and is currently being shared with the blood banks which have the facility to collect and store plasma," said Bhaskar.

The move is aimed at treating Covid patients more effectively and the Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy-led government will launch a plasma donation campaign soon.

As part of the campaign, the state government will reward each donor with a token amount of Rs 5,000.

According to the Health Commissioner, the southern state is spending an amount of Rs 15 crore per day in overall coronavirus arrangements, including treatment, patients' food, accommodation, tests and medicines, among others.

On an average, Andhra Pradesh is testing 65,000 to 70,000 samples per day.

The state on Monday reported 8,368 new coronavirus cases, taking the Andhra Pradesh's tally to 5.06 lakh.