Escape artists: new Omicron subvariants dodge vaccines

In 10 seconds? As the world is trying to shake off the Covid-19 pandemic, new Omicron subvariants are causing rising reinfection rates with the novel coronavirus sneaking through the protective walls of currently available vaccines and even reinfecting people within weeks.

What are these new subvariants? As we know, every time viruses make another copy of themselves, they undergo random errors in their genes causing mutations. The more a virus spreads through a community, the more chances they have to cause different mutations, eventually leading to a new strain, that is genetically different from its parent strain. Omicron variant (BA.1) was identified in the community in November 2021 and soon after, several sub-variants were found, namely BA.2, BA.3, BA.4, and BA.5, each more contagious and transmissible than the previous.