As coronavirus continues to cause uncertainty and hesitation around stepping outside of home, the role of Canberra's cleaners has never been more important.
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According to Anthony Bailey, the senior director of the ACT public school's cleaning service, the role has also never been more valued by the community.
"No one talks about the workers just being a cleaner any more, they are part of an essential workforce," Mr Bailey said.
Read more: Where you can get a face mask in the ACT
In the months since COVID-19 started, the number of cleaning services at large venues such as schools and shopping centres has shot up, in order to prevent the spread of the virus and ease public concern.
Mr Bailey, who oversees more than 500 cleaners at ACT public schools, said cleaning work had increased dramatically.
Rather than carry out cleaning work at the end of a school day, cleaning now begins long before students first step foot in the classroom.
"We've changed a lot of our focus now onto high-frequency touch-point cleaning, things like door handles and light switches and desks," Mr Bailey said.
"The other big part is a two-stage cleaning, the first being a detergent clean to remove the grime and then a sanitiser clean where we go in with disinfectant chemicals to hit it."
Items such as school desks, which were cleaned once a week before the pandemic, are now cleaned daily, to ensure there are no traces of any viruses on common surfaces.
Samir Malak is a site supervisor at Lyneham High School, which had to be closed for a deep clean in March after one of its students attended while potentially contagious with coronavirus.
He said all of the changes to cleaning procedures at the school were challenging at first, but had now become the new normal.
"We started getting more confidence as the days went on, and making sure we had cleaned all of the touch points," Mr Malak said.
"We never used to have a daytime cleaner before, but now cleaners are seen at schools during the day and it's making people feel comfortable about going back to school, and that makes a big difference."
It hasn't just been cleaners of large public venues that have undergone a large change in the wake of the pandemic, with private cleaning companies having their way of working upended by coronavirus.
Manager of Mint Cleaning Group Dora Rodriguez said the types of cleaning that had been carried out had changed dramatically.
"Normally we get a lot of end-of-lease cleaning and there was a big drop in that because people weren't moving out or in during the pandemic," Ms Rodriguez said.
"But that did mean office cleaning ramped up because people wanted to have everything sanitised and disinfected."
Ms Rodriguez said more people had been requesting deep cleaning of homes and offices as a preventative measure.
"The frequency of it has been a change, and it's changed to ensure that people working in the office are free from germs and all of the ensuing surfaces are cleaned," she said.
Mr Bailey said while there was much uncertainty as to what the coming months would hold, the importance of cleaners would remain the same.
"No one could have prepared for what we've gone through the past six months," he said.
"Cleaning is now a growth industry."
Andrew Brown
I've been part of the Canberra Times since 2016, after reporting at local papers in Sydney's north-west. Since starting at the paper I've had stints on the Sunday Times, on the early morning breaking news round, and now as a general reporter, covering the ins and outs of anything and everything happening in Canberra, with a focus on health.
I've been part of the Canberra Times since 2016, after reporting at local papers in Sydney's north-west. Since starting at the paper I've had stints on the Sunday Times, on the early morning breaking news round, and now as a general reporter, covering the ins and outs of anything and everything happening in Canberra, with a focus on health.
