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Changes in human behavior are increasingly recognized as a major determinantof epidemic dynamics. Although collective activity can be modified throughimposed measures to control epidemic progression, spontaneous changes can alsoarise as a result of uncoordinated individual responses to the perceived riskof contagion. Here we introduce a stochastic epidemic model that implementspopulation responses driven by individual- and time-dependent risk-takingpropensity. The model reveals an emergent mechanism for the generation ofmultiple infection waves of decreasing amplitude without the need to considerexternal modulation of parameters. Successive waves tune the effectivereproduction number to its critical value $R=1$. This process is a consequenceof the interplay of the fractions of susceptible and infected population andthe average risk-taking propensity, as shown by a mean-field approach. Theproposed mechanism also shows how, under the threat of contagion, thedistribution of individual risk propensities evolves towards a well-definedprofile. Successive waves trigger selective sweeps of risk-taking propensity ata pace determined by individual risk reaction rates. This kind of collective,self-generated pressure, may therefore shape risk-aversion profiles associatedto epidemics in human groups. The final state is self-organized and generic,independent of the parameter values. We conclude that uncoordinated changes inhuman behavior can, by themselves, explain major qualitative and quantitativefeatures of the epidemic process, as the emergence of multiple waves and thetendency to remain around $R=1$ observed worldwide after the first few waves ofCOVID-19.

Individual risk-aversion responses tune epidemics to critical transmissibility ($R=1$)