The Use of Social and Behavior Change Communication Strategies During the Pandemic: An Analysis Based on Kerala

The year 2020 was marked as a special, unfortunate and unpredictable year in the world history. The wave of pandemic, COVID-19 has badly affected the nuke and corner of the whole world. In India, the state of Kerala reported the first COVID-19 positive case on 30th January, 2020. Since then, the country faced all the difficulties of the pandemic. Being the less positive cases reported state, later, Kerala became the first in positive cases. The relevance of digits or numbers has increased during those days. Some of the words like alert, vigilant, vaccination etc received prominence like never before. Words such as mask, sanitizer, hand wash, social distance, quarantine, community kitchen etc. were used frequently in daily communication. The Keralites were eagerly waiting for the press meet of the Chief Minister at 6 pm. The people have been adapted to and adopted the new and unfamiliar behaviors. Now the pandemic days became mere stories. Here, the researcher analyzes the role of Social and Behavior Change Communication (SBCC) in the precautionary and preventive measures against COVID-19, which were practiced in Kerala.