Fox News co-hosts Jesse Watters explained why he feels it’s time to start looking at reopening the U.S. economy.

Discussing the topic with other co-hosts during a Thursday evening segment of Fox News’ “The Five,” Watters likened the need for a comeback to going underwater and “holding your breath.” Do it too long, and “you’re gonna sustain brain damage or you are going to drown.”

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“You can tell the country is ready to stop holding its breath and get above water and get a gasp of air, because if you keep staying underwater, you’ve already seen depression level economic jobs losses in just one month alone,” Watters said. “This country’s not going to make it to May 1.”

The Fox News co-host explained the federal government’s plan, released Thursday, to reopen the economy in three phases, the first of which involves some business openings and limited people going back to work.

“Because right now, I don’t know, man,” Watters said. “You can feel this country getting angry. And it’s not just at the Chinese. They are getting angry at the governors. They are not allowed to go to church. They don’t have freedom of association. They can’t pursue happiness. This is getting pretty ugly, and we can’t take it anymore.”

Earlier in the segment, co-host Greg Gutfeld expressed his belief that many Americans “are willing at this point to take that risk.” (RELATED: ‘I Wasn’t Thinking Of The Bill Of Rights’: New Jersey Gov Responds To Tucker’s Question About His State’s Social Distancing Order)

“You can count the deaths by a virus, but you have a hard time counting the casualties of a shutdown,” Gutfeld said. “Whether it is suicides, failed businesses, hopelessness, psychiatric consequences, a virus is scarier than the unemployment numbers even though the unemployment numbers could end up killing as many people. But the problem is we can’t count that. It’s too amorphous and anonymous. That always going to be a challenge for a lot of people, they will not be able to see the invisible death.”