L'utilizzo dei Social Media durante la pandemia da COVID-19 : un nuovo strumento per la gestione del rischio sanitario?

The public sector uses social media (SM) for the communication and engagement of citizens. The use of social media quickly increased during the COVID19 pandemic. The literature review highlights that the analysis concerning SM use in public administration is limited at the level of local authorities. Moreover, the analysis considers only a few foreign countries, with little attention to the Italian case. Consequently, this study aims to analyze the use of social media during the COVID19 pandemic within the more affected Italian regions. The results highlight that the use of social media is different in the pandemic era. Furthermore, the results also highlight that the abovementioned Italian regions apply SM to communicate to citizens to manage health risks. At the same time, people tend to interact with institutions more than in the past. Finally, each region uses social media with a different strategy to manage the pandemic and, consequently, to reach citizens. [Publisher's text].