The temporal structure of community deseases

One of the most interesting aspect of epidemiological time series of infectious diseases is the presence of typical, maybe circaannual, periodicities which are usually ascribed to a time varying contact rate. In the present paper the changes in the contact rate are conceived as arising from the spreading of rumors within the population, so giving an new explanation of the observed periodical phenomena which is consistent with the knowledge about the population behavior during epidemics.