Politico reports:

Steven was finally getting his Covid-19 shot because Mama told him to. And nobody crosses Mama.

Standing between the fried bread and slushie stands at the Uinta County fairgrounds in southwestern Wyoming, the 42-year-old in the Trump 2020 hat said “Mama” — his wife — forced him to get vaccinated because of the Delta variant.

“The missus is worried about me going out on a trucking trip,” said Steven, who declined to give his last name. “I don’t need it. I have red hair and blue eyes and the blood type that says I probably won’t get it. But number one rule? Mama’s always right.”

Since the coronavirus emerged in the U.S. in early 2020, Steven has believed he is safe from infection — and not just because of falsehoods spread on social media about protective hair colors or blood types. He’s assumed that he and his family members, many of whom have little reason to go beyond the county border, are safe because of where they live.

But Delta has turned that idea on its head. In Uinta County — twice the size of Rhode Island, but home to only 20,000 people — cases have spiked from six to almost 70 in just a few weeks. While small, the numbers highlight how Delta can permeate even the tiniest, most remote enclaves. The rising infection rates are propelling vaccine holdouts to get the jab. The question now is whether enough people in Uinta and other rural counties across America will get vaccinated before virus spread in their communities becomes uncontrollable, and small local hospitals are overwhelmed. [Continue reading…]