Beijing, Feb 5 (IANS): In recent days, many citizens in Cangshan district of Fuzhou, capital of east China's Fujian Province, received a series of calls.

Over the phone, they were asked questions like "have you come into contact with confirmed coronavirus cases? Do you have symptoms like cough and fever?"

The phone calls are made by robots. In cooperation with China's tech-giant Baidu, the local government established the "Intelligent Cangshan" system. As the coronavirus outbreak continues, robots are introduced to make calls to help coronavirus prevention.

Lin Hui, deputy of the Cangshan Intelligent Centre, said the Artificial Intelligence (AI) platform would make one-to-one phone calls to specific groups and collect information to analyze and form reports.

"The robots can make over 5,000 phone calls per hour, which greatly improves our efficiency in monitoring the disease," said Lin. "With the help of AI, we can have a clear idea about citizens' health and provide guidance for potential patients."

Lin said the platform has already had a test run for two days and made about 30,000 calls to residents.