Coronavirus Texas: New York, California and Brazil COVID-19 variants detected in Houston Methodist genome study

HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — The Houston area is now facing at least five different variants of COVID-19 with the addition of three from New York, Brazil and California.

Study findings released Thursday by the infectious diseases team at Houston Methodist showed the additional three variants have been detected among the 20,453 coronavirus genomes in the area examined since the start of the pandemic.

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The Houston Methodist study is the first to identify the three new variants in the greater Houston area.

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Variants from the United Kingdom and South Africa have already been confirmed by city and county-level health officials, who have described them as being more contagious.

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The findings come from the hospital system’s nation-leading genome sequencing study. Methodist’s team processes as many as 1,700 samples a week. All four variants were detected in the most recent batches of genomes, the hospital told ABC13.

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