SARS-COV-2: INSIGHT INTO THE EMERGING GENETIC VARIANTS

SARS-CoV-2 is a highly contagious virus, which appeared in China in late 2019, spread rapidly and caused the largest pandemic in the last 100 years. Despite the intensive research, there is no specific antiviral drug currently. Effective vaccines have been developed in a short time and they are already widely used. As a RNA virus, SARS-CoV-2 mutates constantly, and several thousand genetic variants have emerged in the course of the pandemic, some of which are associated with increased infectivity, reinfection risk, reduced activity of therapeutic antibodies and reduced effectiveness of vaccines. This review highlights the features in SARS-CoV-2 structure and replication cycle that would help to understand the significance of individual mutations contained in the emerging genetic variants and to predict the impact of mutations on viral transmissibility, disease severity, diagnostics, therapeutics or immune escape. The main characteristics of the variants of concern are presented.