Shalala corrects Spicer on HIPAA: ‘I should know, I wrote it’

Rep. Donna Shalala (D-Fla.) corrected former White House press secretary Sean Spicer on Twitter on Monday after he suggested that naming a White House staffer who tested positive for coronavirus violates the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).

“It’s one thing to report an additional staffer in the White House has tested positive but revealing their name seems like a violation of HIPPA,” Spicer tweeted in response to a report that Chad Gilmartin, an aide to press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, had tested positive.

“That’s not how HIPAA works,” Shalala tweeted in response. “I should know…I wrote it.”

That’s not how HIPAA works.

I should know…I wrote it. https://t.co/tgwxH8EW7A

— Rep. Donna E. Shalala (@RepShalala) October 5, 2020

Shalala served as secretary of Health and Human Services under former-President Clinton from 1993 to 2001.

HIPAA, which passed in 1996, bars the release of sensitive medical information without a patient’s consent.

Shalala’s tweet came the same day that White House doctor Sean Conley cited HIPAA to say he could not go into further detail about President Trump’s progress at Walter Reed Medical Center over his treatment for COVID-19.

McEnany and two of her press aides are the latest people in Trump’s orbit to announce that they have tested positive for the coronavirus, following his campaign manager and three GOP senators, among others.