Update 12:38 p.m.: This story has been updated to reflect how Dallas County is working with the state and federal governments to provide local testing for the virus. It’s also been updated to reflect that Tarrant County hopes to conduct its own coronavirus tests instead of sending them out of state.

Dallas County Health and Human Services says it is working with the state and federal governments to provide quick testing for coronavirus, making it the first lab in Texas with that capacity.

"We’ve dramatically strengthened Dallas County’s testing capability over the last five years, and this specific testing capacity will decrease our test turnaround from 72 hours to less than a day,” Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins said in a news release Wednesday.

The Dallas Morning News first reported the lab’s development earlier this week.

In the U.S., 127 coronavirus cases have been confirmed with nine fatalities. Texas has confirmed 11 cases, all in the San Antonio area.

There are no known confirmed cases of coronavirus in Dallas-Fort Worth.

“We are taking the risk of an outbreak very seriously and are preparing for any level of response that may be needed,” said Dr. Philip Huang, director of Dallas County Health and Human Services. “The ability for us to test for coronavirus locally here in Dallas County is essential to our preparedness efforts and ability to rapidly respond to this evolving situation.”

Tarrant County public health officials also said Wednesday that they hope to conduct local testing for the coronavirus soon. Currently, tests are sent to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.

“Physicians have had to wait several days, up to a week to get results back. So we hope to begin testing locally soon,” Russell Jones, Tarrant County Public Health’s chief epidemiologist, said during a conference call to health care providers.

Vice President Mike Pence, who has been tagged by President Donald Trump to oversee developments in the coronavirus outbreak, recently announced that coronavirus testing would be made available to everyone as soon as possible.

“However, this will involve many commercial labs," Jenkins said. "DCHHS only has the ability to test a limited number of test kits per day. We will continue to follow CDC guidelines at this time, but the turnaround will be greatly enhanced.”

Symptoms of the virus include a runny nose, headache, cough and fever. Shortness of breath, chills and body aches are associated with more dangerous cases of coronavirus, according to the CDC. In serious cases, the virus can cause pneumonia.

Staff writers David Tarrant and Tom Steele contributed to this report.