Prognosis

The Virus Is Constantly Mutating. What That Means for Treating Covid-19 Is Up for Debate

Researchers have identified a variant of the virus that causes Covid-19. It has quickly become the dominant form around the globe.

Researchers quantify structural proteins that will be used to develop a rapid test for Covid-19 at a lab in Rio de Janeiro on April 6.

Photographer: Maria Magdalena Arrellaga/Bloomberg
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As the new coronavirus has spread from person to person, and country to country, the virus has changed thousands of times. The vast majority of these changes are incremental. But last week, researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory posited that at least one variant had significantly mutated to become more contagious.