Chilean couple disenfects subway to survive economically

While the pandemic has left millions unemployed in Chile, couple Denisse and Mario have managed to survive after a quarantine prevented them from opening their street stall: they now disinfect subways in the Chilean capital in exchange for tips.

Each morning, Monday through Friday, the couple carefully hides in nooks of line 5.

Donning disposable suits, gloves and a mask, they go about disinfecting the handrails of the subway cars for eight or nine hours.

Some passengers are surprised to see them cleaning. 30-year-old Denisse Leal said the majority congratulate them for doing the work, but other passengers don't want them near.

During their daily routine,  33-year-old Mario Diaz wipes the cars' handrails while she pours drops of gel alcohol into passengers' hands.

The couple is very careful. If they see guards at a station or inside the cars, they don't go in.

In almost four months, they have been expelled from the subway twice. Vendors and popular singers are banned from the subway.

Chile lost 2.3 million jobs last year - one million unemployed and 1.3 million who do not go out to look for work for fear of contagion and because hundreds of thousands of businesses are closed due to the quarantine in place in greater Santiago.

Denisse and Mario collect between $20 and $30 dollars in tips per day.

When they ran their small business, located at the exit of a subway station, they earned between $115 and $190 per day.

Before the arrival of the pandemic in March, they traveled around Chile selling makeup and telephone accessories at religious festivals.

The woman says that since the beginning of May, when they started their cleaning work, they make money stretch by sharing the food expenses with her mother and grandmother, who take care of their children, Tomás, 3, and Benjamín, 13, while they work.

They give a small portion of their tips to her mother.