Arizona Has Its Own Variant Now
It is a B.1.243 variant that has acquired an E484K (it's got 48 in there—nice) mutation on the spike protein. According to the paper, the B.1.243 variant "is a common circulating variant in the US that was first observed at the start of the pandemic as early as March 2020." So, this AZ variant is mutation of that common variant.
It is "in the process of being established in Arizona," with 53 instances discovered in the state so far. Instances have been detected in New Mexico and Texas too. However, it's hard to say how widespread this variant is (or any of the others are) because we're not doing enough genetic sequencing.
They call this a "variant of interest." I gather that means it's something to keep an eye on rather than something to worry about (which would be called a "variant of concern").
As to what kind of trouble this mutation could cause, the paper says other variants with the E484K mutation have shown resistance to antibodies generated by infection, vaccination, and antibody treatments. They have also been implicated in reinfections. But they don't yet know if this mutation is more infectious or produces more severe disease because of better binding to the ACE2 receptor. That's an effect that's been reported for some of the other variants.
These mutations certainly need to be taken seriously. The UK variant seems to be implicated in the many of the current surges. There is a report of someone in the Navajo Nation who was fully vaccinated who nonetheless contracted the UK variant. The cases was severe enough that it required hospitalization.
The good news is that scientists are now thinking it's possible that the virus has already shown us it's best efforts at mutations. This is because all the variants out there have a similar set of mutations that have arisen independently in different locations. It might be that these changes exhaust the possibilities for mutations the virus can undergo that make it more adaptive.
