• Sohaib R Rufai and Catey Bunce.
• The University of Leicester Ulverscroft Eye Unit, Leicester Royal Infirmary, Robert Kilpatrick Clinical Sciences Building, PO Box 65, Leicester LE2 7LX, UK.
• J Public Health (Oxf). 2020 Aug 18; 42 (3): 510-516.

BackgroundIt is crucial that world leaders mount effective public health measures in response to COVID-19. Twitter may represent a powerful tool to help achieve this. Here, we explore the role of Twitter as used by Group of Seven (G7) world leaders in response to COVID-19.MethodsThis was a qualitative study with content analysis. Inclusion criteria were as follows: viral tweets from G7 world leaders, attracting a minimum of 500 'likes'; keywords 'COVID-19' or 'coronavirus'; search dates 17 November 2019 to 17 March 2020. We performed content analysis to categorize tweets into appropriate themes and analyzed associated Twitter data.ResultsEight out of nine (88.9%) G7 world leaders had verified and active Twitter accounts, with a total following of 85.7 million users. Out of a total 203 viral tweets, 166 (82.8%) were classified as 'Informative', of which 48 (28.6%) had weblinks to government-based sources, while 19 (9.4%) were 'Morale-boosting' and 14 (6.9%) were 'Political'. Numbers of followers and viral tweets were not strictly related.ConclusionsTwitter may represent a powerful tool for world leaders to rapidly communicate public health information with citizens. We would urge general caution when using Twitter for health information, with a preference for tweets containing official government-based information sources.© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Faculty of Public Health. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.

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