What are the new Covid variants and what do they mean for the pandemic? | Coronavirus

From the moment public health officials started to track new variants of coronavirus, it became clear that the same mutations were cropping up time and again and making the virus more troublesome. What are these mutations, what do they do, and what do they mean for the pandemic?

What are mutations?

The genetic code of the coronavirus is held in about 30,000 letters of RNA, a molecule similar to DNA. When the virus infects human cells, the genetic code is copied to make new virus particles. But mistakes happen in the process and these copying errors become mutations in the ...