Plateaus, rebounds and the effects of individual behaviours in epidemics.

Plateaus and rebounds of various epidemiological indicators are widely reported in Covid-19 pandemics studies but have not been explained so far. Here, we address this problem and explain the appearance of these patterns. We start with an empirical study of an original dataset obtained from highly precise measurements of SARS-CoV-2 concentration in wastewater over nine months in several treatment plants around the Thau lagoon in France.