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Privacy concerns have been raised after ministers in Singapore's government acknowledged that data collected by its widely used COVID-19 contact-tracing program may be turned over to police for criminal investigations.

Desmond Tan, minister of state for home affairs, told Parliament on Monday, "The Singapore Police Force is empowered ... to obtain any data, including TraceTogether data, for criminal investigations," Reuters reported.

That was in contrast with previous assurances by the government.

The Environmental Protection Agency adopted a new rule restricting the types of scientific studies its own regulators can use to rein in pollution, in the Trump administration's latest effort to undercut the use of science in establishing public health standards.

Updated 5:08 p.m. ET

Kyle Rittenhouse, a young gunman facing criminal charges in the killing of two men and the serious injury of a third this summer in Kenosha, Wis., entered not guilty pleas to all charges during an arraignment Tuesday.

Scotland First Minister Nicola Sturgeon says President Trump wouldn't be allowed to visit Scotland to golf during its pandemic lockdown, responding to speculation that Trump might travel to a Scottish golf resort rather than attend President-elect Joe Biden's inauguration.

"We are not allowing people to come in to Scotland without an essential purpose right now and that would apply to him, just as it applies to anybody else," Sturgeon said after being asked about Trump on Tuesday. "Coming to play golf is not what I would consider to be an essential purpose."

Iran is asking Interpol to issue a "red notice" for the arrest of President Trump and 47 other U.S. officials, citing the targeted killing a year ago of Qassem Soleimani, a powerful Iranian general. It's the second time Iran has asked for help in detaining the U.S. president.

In response to Tuesday's announcement, Interpol reiterated its stance that it does not consider requests for a red notice that are deemed to be motivated by political or military concerns.

Even as the first doses of vaccine arrive in nursing homes and assisted living communities, the COVID-19 death toll among residents and staff of these facilities continues climbing to staggering heights, with the final month of 2020 proving to be the deadliest of the pandemic for long-term care.

There were more than 5,600 deaths linked to long-term care in the last week of December.

Updated at 2:06 a.m. ET Wednesday

Democrats are hopeful about possibly taking total control of Washington after the Associated Press projected that the party had picked up one of two Georgia Senate seats early Wednesday morning.

The Senate runoff elections in Georgia on Tuesday were set to decide which party will hold the majority in the upper chamber, with Democrats already winning the presidency and holding a slim House majority.

Carlos Reyes wears a mask at home and eats alone in his bedroom. During the night, he has nightmares of accidently infecting his family with COVID-19. During the day, he works as a certified nursing assistant at nursing homes in central Massachusetts, often caring for COVID-19 patients.

Reyes assumed that as a front-line health care worker, he would be among the first to receive the vaccine. But when he asked his nursing homes about getting a shot, the answer was "no."

The New York Stock Exchange is reversing its plan to delist three Chinese telecom companies — a move that was prompted by an executive order from President Trump. The Trump administration has alleged that some Chinese companies funnel money to China's military. China had threatened to retaliate for the move.

In early December, Christine Ghati Alfons taught a menstrual hygiene class to a group of girls, 10 to 15 years old, in the ethnic Kuria community in Migori County, an impoverished, rural area in southwest Kenya. Normally, she says, the class has 25 students. On this day, only 17 girls showed up.

Updated 2 p.m. ET Tuesday

The top U.S. prosecutor in Atlanta resigned from his post Monday, giving no clear reason for his departure.

Many in Washington, D.C., are worried about civil unrest on Wednesday, as the Proud Boys, a group labeled as extremists by the FBI, and other activists gather to protest just as Congress begins to add its imprimatur to last month's Electoral College vote.

That congressional vote will be the final formality leading to the inauguration of President-elect Joe Biden two weeks later.

Updated at 11:38 a.m. ET

In his ongoing quest to overturn the November election, President Trump has demanded total loyalty of his fellow Republicans around the country, but nowhere more dramatically than Georgia — where the last thing Republicans needed was an intraparty fight heading into its competitive U.S. Senate runoffs on Tuesday.

Hospitals are facing the new year with new requirements to post price information they have long sought to obscure: the actual prices they negotiate with insurers and the discounts they offer their cash-paying customers.

Paramedics in Southern California are being told to conserve oxygen and not to bring patients to the hospital who have little chance of survival as Los Angeles County grapples with a new wave of COVID-19 patients that is expected to get worse in the coming days.

The Los Angeles County Emergency Medical Services Agency issued a directive Monday that ambulance crews should administer supplemental oxygen only to patients whose oxygen saturation levels fall below 90%.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is warning health care workers that any changes to the authorized dosing schedules of COVID-19 vaccines currently being administered will significantly place public health at risk and undermine "the historic vaccination effort to protect the population" from the coronavirus pandemic.

President Trump's bid to alter a key set of census numbers has hit another snag with the Census Bureau uncovering even more irregularities with the 2020 head count and the expected release of numbers delayed again.

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signed a "Stand Your Ground" bill into law on Monday, backing off his threat to veto the measure after Ohio lawmakers declined to pass his recommended gun control proposals.

England will go under a new strict national lockdown through mid-February in an attempt to stop the spread of the coronavirus, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in a Monday address.

President-elect Joe Biden did a final campaign push in Georgia on Monday afternoon in support of Democratic Senate candidates the Rev. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff as the state prepares for a tight runoff race that will determine control of the U.S. Senate.

Describing the election as one with seismic implications for the rest of the nation, Biden urged Georgians to turn out on Tuesday and vote for the two Democrats.

A top election official with the Georgia secretary of state's office went line by line Monday refuting allegations made by President Trump about the state's voting system.

The strong pushback by state officials comes a day after a phone call between Trump and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger was made public, in which Trump urged the secretary to "find" enough votes to overturn his loss in the state.

Updated at 7:08 p.m. ET

The Wisconsin pharmacist accused of intentionally sabotaging more than 500 doses of the coronavirus vaccine at Christmastime told police he did it because he believed the drug is somehow hazardous.

"He'd formed this belief they were unsafe," Ozaukee County District Attorney Adam Gerol said of Steven Brandenburg on Monday during a virtual hearing, The Associated Press reported.

The series of events that shook the city of Kenosha, Wis., in August continue to reverberate as victims and their families seek justice.

Within the next two weeks, Kenosha County District Attorney Michael Gravely is expected to decide whether to criminally charge Kenosha police officer Rusten Sheskey in the Aug. 23 shooting of Jacob Blake. Sheskey, who is white, shot Blake, who is Black, seven times in the back as Blake walked away from officers. Blake is now paralyzed.

A hospital worker donned an inflatable, air-powered costume to spread cheer in a California emergency department on Christmas Day.

But now, dozens of hospital staff members have tested positive for the coronavirus, and the hospital said the costume may be to blame.

Hospital officials said 44 staff members tested positive between Dec. 27 and Jan. 3 in the emergency department at Kaiser Permanente San Jose Medical Center. One emergency department worker who had a shift on Christmas died from COVID-19 complications.

The national campaign to vaccinate people against COVID-19 is off to a rocky start. Expectations just a month ago were for 20 million people to be vaccinated by the end of December. But as of Monday morning, just 4.5 million people have received their first dose, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Updated at 3:07 p.m. ET

Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., who defended President Trump in the investigation into Russia's interference in the 2016 election, has been awarded the Medal of Freedom, the White House announced Monday.

In announcing the award, the White House said Nunes helped "unearth the crime of the century" and "thwart a plot to take down a sitting United States president" — despite both being patently false.

The award to Nunes was criticized by the watchdog group, the Government Accountability Project.

Pittsburgh police are searching for a white truck in connection with an incendiary device thrown from a vehicle on Sunday night. A second explosion was reported in the city a short time later.

The first event took place just after 9 p.m. on Penn Avenue in the city's Lawrenceville area. The device was thrown from a moving vehicle and landed under a parked car, as NPR member station WESA reported.

All 67 of the upcoming men's March Madness games will be played in Indiana, the NCAA announced Monday, in a bid to stage the college basketball tournament that had to be canceled last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The organization said it's still determining whether fans will be able to attend games.

"The 2021 version of March Madness will be one to remember, if for no other reason than the uniqueness of the event," said Dan Gavitt, NCAA senior vice president of basketball.

More than 200 engineers and other workers have formed a union at Google, a breakthrough in labor organizing in Silicon Valley where workers have clashed with executives over workplace culture, diversity and ethics.

Across half a dozen Google offices in the U.S. and Canada, 226 workers signed cards to form the Alphabet Workers Union, the group said on Monday. They are supported by the Communications Workers of America, which represents workers in telecommunications and media.