We have all witnessed that the coronavirus mutates quickly, but does that mean it becomes more transmissible or severe? Will the vaccines work against the new dominant mutations of the virus found in the US, UK, SA and other countries?

Prof Salim Abdool Karim sat down with TimesLIVE to break down frequently asked questions about mutations, vaccines, immunity and more. 

He explained there are thousands of variants around the world, but not all of them are a cause for concern. However, some mutations become more dominant than others, as we have seen with the 501Y.V2 variant.

Because of the variants, people are curious about how effective the Covid-19 vaccines will prove to be.

“It’s very unlikely the current vaccines won’t be effective on the variants, whether in the UK or SA or other variants, especially when it comes to severe illness and hospitalisation,” British vaccine deployment minister Nadhim Zahawi told Sky News.

“All manufacturers - Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, Oxford-AstraZeneca and others - are looking at how they can improve their vaccines to make sure we are ready for any variant. There are about 4,000 variants around the world.”

TimesLIVE