When you google "healthcare workers during COVID", the second search result is an article by The Lancet entitled 'COVID-19: A Heavy Toll on Healthcare Workers", second only to the government website with official protocol for healthcare professionals. By comparison, upon searching "cleaners during COVID-19", one has to move to midway down the second search page to reach an article regarding the toll COVID-19 has had on cleaners, and even then, it is by a relatively niche and unknown publication based in the US. It is only once you reach midway down the third search page that you find a BBC article about how cleaners are coping with the pandemic. This is the 27th Google search result. As one of the main groups of key workers working on the frontline and the main, if not only, workforce whose job is quite literally killing germs, and therefore, killing COVID, this is shocking.
Over summer of 2020, I worked as a cleaner in Sainsburys. While working this job, I came to realise just how exposed cleaners were and still are to the risk of COVID-19 infection and how they were meant to be a character in the hero narrative, but did not seem to receive the due praise. Less obvious, I also saw how, in the context of the pandemic, the supermarket was the place where one would be surrounded by the most people at any one moment - with public transport heavily reduced or empty, festivals and crowds forbidden, leisure centres closed, and most professions working from home, where else would we be that posed the biggest risk for COVID-19 infection? Nowhere. These realisations combined, I became curious about the feelings and experiences of my colleagues - Max, Jenna and Aaron - and so, a month into my work, I began asking them how they felt and, with their permission, have published their responses here. Importantly, I separate myself from my then colleagues because I knew this was temporary work for me, but for them, this was their everyday.
Upon returning back to university, leaving my colleagues in this underpaid, underpraised yet unbelievably necessary work, I also learnt that two of my friends - Kate and Ben - had been working as cleaners and domestic assistants in COVID wards, and so I have documented their perspectives here too.
It sounds simple, but my first question to my ex-colleagues was 'how are you?' Max said he was tired, exhausted in fact, by the long, irregular and odd hours of work: “I'm shattered - it's such weird hours. During COVID, we all have to do a lot more overtime and again that makes it even more exhausting”. Jenna, naturally, voiced a lot of fear and worry: “I’m so scared - I see the news stories and it terrifies me, what if I get it? I see my parents all the time - what if I give it to them”. For Jenna, the asymptomatic nature of the virus made it particularly scary - the idea that she could have it, not know and give it to those she loved. Finally, Aaron said he felt numb but also frustrated: “I feel apathetic now, it's all I have to do, so I just come and do it. At the end of the day, financially speaking, I have no choice but to do it”. And as for the frustration, he said: “Customers come here to shop and they sort of look at us like we are in the way, like we are a nuisance. The other day I was wiping a handle on a fridge door with some anti-bac and a woman was about to use it and gave me a look as if I was inconvenient.” Where Aaron and all other cleaners have had to continue working in unsafe conditions at the risk of their own health, this illustrates how acts of social isolation and social distancing are in fact privileges - something many of us forgot throughout the pandemic. Importantly, upon asking my ex-colleagues how they were, I didn’t need to push for any of the information they had given me - testament to the emotions they were, and had been, holding in for a while. Perhaps, no one had actually asked them how they were coping.
Thinking back to ‘Clap For Key Workers’, the national ritual that now thankfully has been classed as inappropriate, it was initially intended for cleaners, porters, receptionists, supermarket workers and all other non-healthcare key workers as well as healthcare professionals. While this wasn't entirely forgotten, largely speaking, the praise for these other key workers failed to be translated in the ‘hero’ narrative. Upon asking my ex-colleagues about this label and whether they felt it encapsulated them too, there was a unanimous agreement that it didn't. Max said: “No I don’t feel like it on any level: I don't feel like anyone in the public looks at me like a hero and I don't feel like one myself”. Jenna said that she didn't feel like she had been granted hero status by society - certainly not on the level that healthcare professionals had - but that, ironically, this actually made her feel like more of a hero to herself: “Its weird, I think the fact I wasn’t and still barely am getting any praise for what I do, actually made me respect myself more.” It felt bittersweet to hear Jenna say this: pleased that she respected herself but sad as to the reason why. These sentiments, when put in conversation with the sentiments of healthcare professionals about the damaging effects of the label ‘hero’, makes me wonder whether it is ‘better’ to have too much or too little praise, what is the better of the two evils?
Harking back to the first lockdown, I recall how strange it was seeing everything shut and the streets entirely empty. Stranger still, and especially when the process of normalisation was under way, was visiting a supermarket: 'there's so many people!', I would say to myself as I tried to process the sensory overload. As people who have worked in this environment, one of the few that has retained its pre-COVID existence, I asked my ex-colleagues how they would describe the atmosphere inside the supermarket: “I think it's a mixture really: I think there's a lot of tension, people almost fighting to get what they need for them and their family and trying to avoid getting too close to as many people as possible. But, it's also quite warm and relaxed: you can see a lot of people feel quite happy and relaxed to just do something normal and to also be actually focusing on doing something. In a period where you are doing nothing a lot, of course it's quite fun to be doing something.” said Jenna. Giving his answer, Ben said: “It depends really, I feel like when I see an elderly person and I see them walk the aisles, the atmosphere sort of changes in that people are aware there is someone around them who is probably high-risk and so everyone becomes a bit more careful and tense. I'd say it's a big mixture and driven by the customers' attitudes towards COVID - you may even go as far as to say each aisle has a different atmosphere!” These answers, more complex than I had expected for just a supermarket, highlight the significance of the supermarket in the time of the pandemic - its role as a social force, the biggest of the moment, and ability to induce fear and create comfort.
Moving now to the perspectives of my friends who had been cleaning on COVID wards, Kate’s experience was as sad as I had imagined but at times, happier than I expected: “It was intense. So intense. My goodness, seeing people struggle and be so insanely ill. It was hard to watch, especially if someone had passed of course. Naively, it’s not what I had expected going into the job.” Upon asking how she coped with the tragedy she witnessed, Kate cited the sense of community she felt with her colleagues and the doctors and nurses working on the frontline in the hospital: “I really felt a sense of togetherness - we all really supported each other. As well, even if the rest of the public and politicians didn't raise cleaners onto any pedestal, I always felt like people working in the hospital really valued us. The amount of times I got told by healthcare workers that they couldn't have done it without me - that really kept me going and made me feel valued.” Where key workers have been under such extreme stress and with very little compensation, it is comforting to know that at the very least, they have had each other and have enjoyed some form of social contact. Not enough to compensate for what they have endured by any means, but something at the very least.
Ben, another friend of mine who worked as a domestic assistant in a hospital throughout the July lockdown, echoed Kate's sentiments, saying: “The staff were lovely, there were lots of ‘thank you’s”. Ben's experience as a domestic assistant was somewhat different to Kates, saying that overall it was “a very positive experience. I am quite grateful for it. It was nice to be part of a team, without that, I would have been very isolated of course”. Ben elaborated, saying that even the minimal contact he was allowed to have with people was enjoyable and allowed for some sense of normalcy. More importantly, Ben said that without this job he wouldn't have known that, in fact, working in a clinical setting is what he wants to do for a living, even in a post-pandemic world, a particularly positive, long term outcome from the pandemic for him personally.
Upon re-interrogating perceptions of the label 'hero' with Ben, he said that he wouldn't consider himself a hero, rather feeling like he was just “doing his bit”. However, he did say that he felt immense pride for his colleagues and for healthcare professionals, saying “they have done an amazing job!”. On its usage in relation to him, Ben felt that it was very “touch and go - sometimes we were included and others not”. Signalling to another major theme of the pandemic, Ben said that he often felt domestic cleaners were blamed for increased spread and seen as harbingers of the virus into previously low-case areas and therefore sometimes not seen as worthy of the hero title. Further, he said that sometimes he was viewed as not doing important enough work, certainly not enough to constitute a hero: “In my city we got free transport for key workers, and on occasion bus drivers would say that we were just cleaners, not key workers”. Specifically in relation to politicians, Ben said he felt the ‘hero’ narrative was more directed towards healthcare professionals but that he did, occasionally, feel part of it. However, the fact he did feel included, consequently, made him feel even angrier when legislation was inappropriate for containing the spread. In this sense, Ben, was one of many key workers who felt first hand the hypocrisy of politicians throughout the pandemic.
Touching on another element, Kate said that she did not feel part of the hero narrative and that that wasn't necessarily to do with the publics perception of her, but do with how she was treated by the hospital and cleaning management: "The issue is, we have different pay, much lower than NHS clinical staff, we get less sick leave, harsher sanctions if we are sick and we are looked down upon by many people in managerial positions". For Kate, all 'heroes', especially heroes of the same battle, working on the same frontline, should be treated equally. Where this wasn't the case, she felt excluded. Similar to Ben, Kate also felt that politicians would include cleaners in the hero narrative but that it was "transparently fake and very performative", explaining that "it was all talk and no action - it felt very disingenuous".
On the topic of political hypocrisy, where there had been such severe PPE shortages for healthcare professionals, I was curious as to whether domestic cleaners and assistants had been affected as well. Where most of the headlines about PPE shortages focused on NHS clinical staff, I felt it important to ask this question to Ben: if the lack of PPE filled healthcare professionals with anxiety and fear and left them feeling undervalued, then surely, by the nature of their shared humanity, domestic assistants and cleaners, felt the same way? Answering, Ben said: “We weren't badly hit, but yes, we were told to be wise with our resources, for example, not to go through loads of masks. The FFP3 mask shortage is probably what we were hit hardest by. This was definitely where I noticed I was feeling a lot of anxiety and fear about my health and my families - I mean I was on the front line with a mask that wasn't necessarily fit-for-purpose".
As someone both involved in the 'battle' but also an observer, I was curious to hear Ben’s thoughts and reflections on the atmosphere within the hospital: “It was tense, it was definitely palpable due to the uncertainty and novelty of the situation. No one had any idea what the virus was or how to treat it. People were very cautious.” As time went on however, and the virus, while retaining its devastating effects, lost its novelty and medical knowledge ‘caught up’, Ben said that “people could start getting comfortable with what was going on and what they were treating. When this started to happen, and the tension reduced a notch, you could see doctors and nurses and other people working in the hospital, actually beginning to have conversations with each other about non-medical things. This was nice to see because key workers just haven't had a second to themselves.”
While the pandemic has been experienced and felt in many different ways, it has also been a time where we have all been experiencing a similar set of emotions and had a heightened level of empathy for one another. With this in mind, I was curious as to whether the cleaners I spoke to felt a sense of community with other cleaners, even those who do not share the same workspace:"I definitely feel a sense of connectedness and empathy now when I see someone cleaning, be it in a supermarket, office space or in a hospital. Throughout the pandemic, cleaners have seen, done and risked so much and for even less pay than clinical staff. I definitely feel part of that community - what they do is actually quite amazing, despite it being 'just' cleaning", said Ben. Upon asking Jenna, she said that prior to the pandemic she had "never considered the importance of a cleaner and especially in fighting infection and keeping the population safe" and that consequently, the pandemic has made her feel incredibly proud not just to be cleaner, but for other cleaners to be part of a workforce that have been so pivotal in fighting COVID-19. Here, Jenna raises a salient point: cleaners are absolutely instrumental in fighting infection, and especially one that is spread by droplet infection. It is important to acknowledge too that cleaning is very labour-intensive work - the person behind the mop is much more important then the mop itself. In this sense, cleaning is not just hygienically important for the general population but also physically straining, and in the context of COVID-19, mentally taxing too - reasons why cleaners should be respected and paid more.
Lastly, with the unique vantage point that cleaners have occupied throughout the pandemic, I asked all of my ex-colleagues and friends whether there was anything they would want the public to know from their experience. The answers they gave were all totally identical: get vaccinated, wear a mask in public spaces and be aware of who is around you. For Jenna, Max and Aaron, doing these things was a matter of respect for others who may be vulnerable and for those who work in crowded spaces where infection is likely. And, for Kate and Ben, this was about the fact that people are still catching, spreading, suffering and dying of COVID. While public legislation may paint the pandemic as waning or finished, their stories highlight that it isn't and that we must still do what we can to protect ourselves, others and all key workers.
From these discussions with colleagues and friends of mine who took on cleaning roles either before or during the pandemic, I have learnt that cleaners have been and still are at the centre of the pandemic - be it in a supermarket or in a hospital. They are in the centre because their job, regardless of environment, is focused on protecting others from COVID-19 infection at the risk of infecting themselves and therefore their loved ones. Where the general public have been asked to isolate, cleaners have been asked to keep working, and in fact, work harder than ever before. As our levels of social contact have decreased, perhaps become non-existent, theirs have remained the same or increased, and all too often without a positive outcome. The purpose of this piece is to shine a light on the perspectives of cleaners, as key workers who have received very little attention, and to give them a platform to feel heard and somewhat represented. As we edge closer and closer to a post pandemic world, and people begin reflecting on the pandemic, I hope we see more in-depth accounts of cleaners' experiences because their voices offer great insight.