COVID-19: What you need to know about the coronavirus pandemic on 22 July

The total number of confirmed cases now stands at more than 14.9 million worldwide, according to the Johns Hopkins University of Medicine. The death toll has reached more than 616,000.

Passengers of China-bound flights must provide negative COVID-19 test results before boarding, China’s aviation authority has said.

The US saw more than 1,000 deaths from COVID-19 on 21 July, according to Reuters, the first time since 10 June the daily death toll has risen to four-figures.

The Australian state of Victoria has reported a record daily increase of 484 confirmed new COVID-19 cases, up on 374 the previous day. Parts of Victoria, including Melbourne are under lockdown.

In Iran, there has been a record 229 deaths in the past 24 hours, according to health ministry figures.

Almost one-in-four people in Delhi may have been infected with the coronavirus according to a survey of 20,000 people between 27 June and 10 July.

Scientists in South Africa want to recruit 2,000 people into COVID-19 vaccine trials, a vital extension of the work already done by the UK’s University of Oxford.

Two leading UK scientists have warned that COVID-19 is here to stay – with or without a vaccine.

The BBC reports Prof. Sir Jeremy Farrar, director of biomedical health charity the Wellcome Trust, told the House of Commons' Health Committee: “This infection is not going away... Even if we had a vaccine or very good treatments, humanity will still be living with this virus for very many, many years… decades to come.”

It’s an outlook shared by Prof. Sir John Bell, of the University of Oxford, which is engaged in COVID-19 vaccine research and trials.

He told MPs it was unlikely the disease would ever be completely eliminated despite the encouraging early results of the trials.

"The reality is that this pathogen is here forever, it isn't going anywhere. Look at how much trouble they've had in eliminating, for example, polio, that eradication programme has been going on for 15 years and they're still not there.

"So this is going to come and go, and we're going to get winters where we get a lot of this virus back in action.”

Some Central American nations are seeing their highest-ever weekly increases in the number of confirmed COVID-19, according to the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO).

PAHO warned that the pandemic shows “no signs of slowing down” across the American continents, reports Reuters. There have been 900,000 confirmed new cases and almost 22,000 confirmed deaths reported this past week - Brazil, Mexico and the US accounting for most of those numbers.

In a virtual briefing, Carissa Etienne, Director of PAHO, called on individual nations to pay close attention to the data and work to limit not just the number of COVID-19 deaths, but the incidence of complications and unexpected consequences, too.

“The impact of co-morbidities on the spread of the virus should be a clarion call to every country in the Americas: Use data to tailor your response and make health your top priority,” she said.