Lambda COVID variant found in Texas hospital

• WHO categorizes it as a "variant of interest." It has been detected in 29 countries.

Driving the news: Houston Methodist Hospital reported its first case of the Lambda COVID-19 variant on Monday.

• The hospital had a little more than 100 COVID-19 patients across the eight hospitals in its network last week, but that number rose to 185 as of Monday. The majority of the infections are in those who remain unvaccinated.
• 85% have been diagnosed with the Delta variant, per ABC News, which is the top concern across the U.S. as it accounts for 83% of nationwide cases.

What they're saying: "I don't think there's sufficient evidence at this point that we should be more concerned about lambda than delta, I still think delta is the primary concern for us," Wesley Long, medical director of Diagnostic Microbiology at Houston Methodist, said, per ABC.

• "There's a lot more evidence that we have that delta is much more contagious, the viral loads are much higher," he added.