International travel bans can't stay in place forever - that's the message from the World Health Organization.
Officials held a media conference in Geneva this morning.
They said it would be almost impossible for individual countries like New Zealand to keep borders closed for the foreseable future.
Dr Mike Ryan, head of the organisation's emergency programme, said travel restrictions needed to be used in conjunction with public health measures, including social distancing, hand washing and face mask wearing.
He said essentially closing off can't be a long-term approach.
"Continuing to keep international borders sealed is not necessarily a sustainable strategy for the world's economy, for the world's poor or for anybody else so we really do have to make progress on beginning to do that, but do it in a way that is least risky."
According to the World Health Organization, cases worldwide have around about doubled in the past six weeks.
There has now been 16.3 million confirmed cases worldwide since the pandemic began.
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