German Minister of Health Jens Spahn arrives at the weekly cabinet meeting at the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany January 29, 2020. REUTERS/Michele Tantussi

BERLIN (Reuters) - German Health Minister Jens Spahn said he expected the federal government to reach an agreement with authorities in the state of Hesse in the next few hours to get an evacuation of German citizens from China underway due to the coronavirus outbreak.

Spahn said Germany wanted to fly citizens in Wuhan - the Chinese city where the coronavirus outbreak began - and the province of Hubei as quickly as possible but wanted to ensure the evacuation was well prepared before evacuees are transported to Frankfurt, the capital of Hesse.

“We are therefore in close contact with the Hessian authorities to come to a solution between the federal government and authorities there and I assume that we will succeed in that in the next few hours so that the plane can take off quickly,” he told reporters.