"If you don't understand what was happening, then you won't fix it for the next time, so I wanted to be very transparent about what went right and what didn't go right," Birx told "Good Morning America" in an interview Monday.
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She described her response to the moment Trump raised the possibility of injecting disinfectant into people to treat COVID-19.
"I'm a pretty direct person, so I immediately went to his most senior staff ... and said this has to be reversed immediately. By the next morning, the president was saying it was a joke. But I think he knew by that even clearly that this was dangerous.
WATCH: Birx discusses phone call with Trump after COVID warning
Birx discusses phone call with Trump after COVID warning
She also noted that she had a pact with Dr. Anthony Fauci, former CDC director Robert Redfield and former FDA commissioner Stephen Hahn.
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"If any one of the individuals were under so much pressure and they were fired, we would all leave together from the [White House Coronavirus] task force," she said.
Birx's book, "Silent Invasion: The Untold Story of The Trump Administration, COVID-19, and Preventing the Next Pandemic Before It's Too Late," will be published Tuesday, April 26.