In mutant variants, has the coronavirus shown its best tricks?

At this point it is still too soon to know, the mutations observed can be similar just because they are the easiest to get, not because they are the only ones possible. But still, at some point the changes can make the virus less adapted to infect humans and hopefully this point will be reach soon. After that the equilibrium is on the side of the humans, either the virus changes too much and is no longer able to infect properly or the virus changes too little and is caught in the immune response to previous infectious or the vaccines.

Also, people that understand how language is used will not make the mistake of thinking that phrases like "the virus is not that clever" are meant to be literal.

rex beat me to it. I was going to say, time will tell.

Virusrex, forgot if I've posted this one before, but excellent review article on preservation and loss of immunity to coronaviruses in human challenge studies, etc. If you haven't seen this article, it's somewhat depressing, as it adds more "too soon to know" logs to the fire.

Huang et al "A Systematic review of antibody mediated immunity to coronaviruses: antibody kinetics, correlates of protection and association of antibody responses with severity of disease" Nature Communications volume 11, Article number: 4704 (2020)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-18450-4

Everyone counts what already has been counted and feels comforted. The reality is the virus mutates at an alarming rate when in its host allowing for multiple iterations of itself during the infectious state. Matching the rate is not the same as inoculating the world in real time let alone any leaps between species. This is far from over and placating people's fears only adds to individuals failing to vigilantly protecting themselves...

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www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/02/12/china-covid-misinformation-li-meng-yan/