24/05/2026
This really highlights the reality of specialist cleaning.
We handle the jobs most people wouldn’t want to face — from biohazards and trauma scenes to hoarding, sewage and extreme cleans. It takes training, resilience and pride to restore spaces safely.
Huge respect to Majed and everyone in the industry. It’s tough work, but it genuinely makes a difference.
If you’re looking for a new challenge where no two days are the same, we’d love to hear from you at Aspire Cleaning Services.
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☣ A biohazard cleaner who has spent 20 years washing blood from murder scenes and scraping faeces off prison walls has said his “perfect day” would involve clearing litres of “literal crap” from blocked drains.
🧽 Majed Ghouse, 56, from east London, left his job as a mechanic in 2007 to become a cleaner and quickly found satisfaction in transforming filthy, flooded bathrooms.
He said he has since gone on to tackle extreme scenes, including a hotel room where a person was killed and left “blood all over the carpet”, and an accidental explosion at a farm where someone died.
He often visits police stations and prisons, where he cleans cells contaminated with infectious diseases.
Majed said he has even jet-washed train tracks after people were struck by trains, searched for body parts on the line, and cleaned road traffic collision sites so thoroughly “you wouldn’t have even known it happened”.
Majed said he has learned to switch off and “get on with the job”, focusing on what clients need while using specialist equipment like fogging machines and protective suits.
Majed, a father of three, told PA Real Life: “I know people don’t like this, but I absolutely love doing drains.
“I enjoy unblocking them, even when they’re full, it’s a perfect day at work.
“I’ve been up to my waist in it before.
“People think it’s grim, but I like seeing the difference once it’s all cleaned.”
Majed had worked as a mechanic since his twenties, but in 2007 he decided he “wanted to try a new role”, so he visited his local job agency to explore what opportunities were available.
He spotted a vacancy for a biohazard cleaner at Rentokil Specialist Hygiene and applied, thinking he would try it for about six months.
He explained: “It appealed to me because it was different – that’s all it was.
“They told me I might see some dirty stuff, but I wanted to give it a go, I’m not afraid of hard graft.
“They said it might involve picking up needles and cleaning sewage and blood.”
When he found out he had got the job a few days later, he was “excited to get stuck in” – his first task was cleaning a flooded bathroom in a block of flats.
Majed recalled: “The bath and toilet needed a deep clean, so I sanitised everything.
“There was a lot of literal crap everywhere, but I made it bright and clean again.
“I felt really satisfied afterwards – the customer was over the moon, and it felt good to get a compliment from my very first client.”
As time went on, he was called out for more advanced jobs.
One of his most memorable was in 2021, when he was asked to clean a hotel room after a killing, where there was “blood all over the carpet”.
Majed said he spent hours removing the carpet and sanitising the floor beneath.
He has also cleaned up after a fatal farming accident.
Majed explained: “The person died when a gas bottle exploded in a barn while they were putting machinery away.
“I had to clean up all the walls.”
“Once the job is done and I shut the door, I don’t think about it any more.
“I focus on normal things, like what I’m going to eat. I can’t keep thinking about what I’ve seen.
“Even when I had three barrels of blood in the back of my van to dispose of, I didn’t dwell on it.”
When dealing with death or trauma scenes, Majed said he has to be “fully protected”, wearing a respirator mask, gloves and a protective suit.
He said: “The mask is one of the most important things, because otherwise the smell of death can stay with you for weeks.
“You also have to focus on the client – we ask what they want removed from the scene, and I always try to break the ice and ask how they are.”
When entering a home where someone has died, Majed begins by using a fogging system to disinfect the area.
After about an hour, he said, the smell is usually reduced, and he uses products such as sanitising agent to scrub problem areas, particularly where the body was found.
“I do get emotional when I hear someone’s story, but I have to put that to one side and get on with the job,” Majed explained.
“Some cases are worse than others – the body is around 60% water, and if someone isn’t found for weeks, they start decomposing.
“I’ve done jobs where someone has died on the floor and a downstairs neighbour’s ceiling has gone brown because they were lying there for so long.”
He finds suicides the hardest jobs emotionally, particularly as there is often an increase at Christmas.
Over the years, he has also jet-washed train tracks after people have jumped.
“Once, someone lost an arm and I had to go on to the tracks and find it,” he said.
Earlier this year, he was called to a road traffic collision where someone had died, and he was tasked with cleaning the scene after emergency services had finished.
“You wouldn’t have even known it had happened after I was done,” he said.
“I never deal with the bodies, but sometimes they are still there when I arrive.
“At one crash, the body had been in a tent, and I had to sanitise it afterwards.”
Throughout 2024 and 2025, he was also called out to clean buildings after protests, including incidents involving groups such as Just Stop Oil and Palestine Action, where red paint had been thrown over properties across the country.
“One time, I had to get there at 4.30am. It took hours – we had to hose everything down.” he added.
One of the most unpleasant jobs he has done “countless times” is cleaning up “dirty protests” in prisons, where inmates smear faeces on cell walls.
He said: “It takes a couple of hours, and I have to make everything safe and sanitary again.”
He is also called to clean police cells, which he says “aren’t as bad as prisons”.
Majed added: “One time someone with hepatitis B had been in a cell, so I had to fog and sanitise everything – the walls, bed, mattress and chair.”
Over the past five years, he has seen an increase in mould removal jobs, which he believes may be linked to greater awareness after the death of two-year-old Awaab Ishak in Rochdale in 2020, who died after being exposed to mould.
“I’ve been in flats where you move furniture and find entire walls covered in thick black mould,” he said.
“It’s awful – we have to use really strong chemicals to get rid of it.”
He travels the country in a fully equipped van, including specialist drainage tools – he has even been “up to his waist” in sewage before.
Despite working in such conditions, he still “finds the time” to keep his own home “spotless”, something his loved ones often comment on.
He believes he has stayed in the job for nearly two decades because no two days are the same.
“I travel all over the UK and I love it,” he said.
“I take pride in my work, and I can’t see myself stopping any time soon.”
For more information, visit: www.rentokil-hygiene.co.uk.
✍ By Molly Powell, PA Real Life
