Alcuni nodi della comunicazione pubblica digitale di fronte alla pandemia. Le regioni italiane su Facebook durante il lockdown.

The article addresses the role of institutional public communication during the Covid-19 pandemic, an apolitical communication, conceived as a service for citizens, exploring the use of social media by public institutions. In a theoretical framework concerning the international and national literature on public sector communication, a quantitative-qualitative research will is illustrated that is based on the collection and analysis of all the posts generated by the Italian regions on their official Facebook pages, from the beginning of the pandemic to the end of the lockdown in 2020. The research shows a significant growth of followers, an almost exclusive treatment of issues relating to Covid-19, a particular attention to communicating epidemiological-health data and the rules to face the emergency which, however, does not correspond to a high online public’ engagement. A qualitative analysis concerns the way in which the regions have managed the communication of data, highlighting the diversity of approaches adopted.