Health Secretary Matt Hancock has shared a photo of himself taking part in a clinical trial to establish if plasma from the blood of recovered coronavirus patients could help treat others fighting the illness.
Mr Hancock, who recovered after testing positive for COVID-19 in late March, tweeted: "This hugely important clinical trial will help our NHS treat coronavirus patients using plasma.
"If you're asked, please take part. It's painless."
The national randomised clinical trial will help to determine if plasma collected from donors who have recovered from COVID-19, known as "convalescent plasma", is an effective treatment for patients who are severely unwell with the illness.
If effective, a national programme will deliver up to 10,000 units of plasma a week to the NHS to help treat coronavirus (COVID-19) patients.
This would provide enough plasma to treat 5,000 patients each week.
Plasma from recovered COVID-19 patients can be transfused to patients who are struggling to produce their own antibodies against the virus.
The Department of Health and Social Care is working in collaboration with NHS Blood and Transplant and the other UK blood services, Public Health England and NHS Digital to deliver the programme.
Matt Hancock said: "This global pandemic is the biggest public health emergency this generation has faced and we are doing absolutely everything we can to beat it.
"The UK has world-leading life sciences and research sectors and I have every hope this treatment will be a major milestone in our fight against this disease.
"Hundreds of people are participating in national trials already for potential treatments and the scaling up of convalescent plasma collection means thousands could potentially benefit from it in the future."
Professor Jonathan Van Tam, Deputy Chief Medical Officer, said: "The UK is leading the world’s largest trials to find a treatment for COVID-19, with over 7,000 people so far involved testing a range of medicines; we hope to add convalescent plasma to this list shortly.
"Convalescent plasma has been used as an effective treatment for emerging infections in the past, and this step forward underpins our science-backed approach to fighting this virus."
Dr Gail Miflin, Chief Medical Officer, NHS Blood and Transplant, said: "As well as continuing to collect enough blood throughout this outbreak, we are also heavily involved in the national research response including major trials of this potential treatment.
"We are rapidly building our capability to collect plasma so that we can quickly move into supplying hospitals at scale, should the proposed trial demonstrate patient benefit."
