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

HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) – The Houston area now has 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 team of infectious diseases at Houston Methodist showed that the additional three variants among the 20,453 coronavirus genomes in the area that have been investigated since the onset of the pandemic have been detected.

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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 of the United Kingdom and South Africa has already been confirmed by health and city health officials, who have described them as more contagious.

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The findings come from the country-leading genome-sequence study of the hospital system. Methodists’ team processes as many as 1,700 samples per week. All four variants were detected in the most recent groups taken, the hospital told ABC13.

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