Abstract:  In order to better understand the current status of COVID-19 research and global cooperation, based on Web of Science database, social network analysis and bibliometrics methods are used to make visual analysis of co-citation of journals, cooperation networks of countries and institutions, and co-occurrence networks of research hotspots, etc. and further to explore the current status and characteristics of related research. The results show that Chinese institutions produced much literature, but after analyzing the nature of nodes from the perspective of the network, it is found that the United Kingdom or some other European countries, and the institutions/schools in the United States have a higher degree of closeness centrality or betweenness centrality in the network. In addition, besides being a hot spot in the medical field, research on COVID-19 has spread to other disciplines such as neurology and occupational health. This study can help scientific researchers and policy makers to objectively grasp the development trend of the epidemic situation and to carry out cooperative research. It will provide reference for countries to explore global cooperation in the field of public health and to improve the response to major epidemics and public health governance plans.

Key words: COVID-19, social network analysis, bibliometrics, visual analysis